There’s lots of talk about college being a training ground for your profession. Parents (and kids) get nervous about spending money on a degree that doesn’t offer a return on the investment. Some people think that learning to read, write and think through a liberal arts education that focuses on philosophy and classics doesn’t prepare you for the “real” world. Here are some examples of Johnnies with amazing careers that created a lasting impact in their discipline. So, what can you make with a St. John’s degree?
You could make an impact in technology like James H. Frame, computer programming pioneer at IBM, and former vice president of software at ITT, James Portnow writer, game designer, co-founder of the Extra Credits YouTube channel.
You could explore the arctic like James B. Lockwood and Tutor Llyd Wells.
You could produce music like Ahmet Ertegun who founded Atlantic Records in 1947 or Jac Holzman who founded Elektra Records in 1950 while a student at St. John’s.
You could make TV & movies like Dimitri Devyatkin, Emmy-nominated video artist and filmmaker, Jonathan D. Krane, film producer of Battlefield Earth, Look Who’s Talking and Face/Off, Jeremy Leven, author, screenwriter and director whose works include Don Juan DeMarco and The Notebook, or Charles Van Doren, garnered notoriety for his involvement in the rigged game show Twenty-One, or Lee David Zlotoff, creator of MacGyver and Remington Steele, and director of The Spitfire Grill (1996), which won the Audience Award at the Sundance Film Festival.
A better military like United States Marine Corps Lieutenant General Lewis J. Fields, Brigadier General William H. Harrison, U.S. Navy Seal Erik S. Kristensen, U.S. Army brigadier general Robert Houston Noble, or U.S. Marine Corps Lieutenant General Reginald H. Ridgely Jr.
You could make music like Eilen Jewell, blues and Americana singer/songwriter, Lhasa de Sela, singer-songwriter, or Glenn Yarbrough, original lead tenor of The Limeliters.
Or you could compose one of the most sung songs for the most number of years in America like Francis Scott Key, United States Attorney for the District of Columbia and lyricist of the United States national anthem, “The Star-Spangled Banner.”
You can make a better America through public service Michael Anton, a senior national security official, become the Mayor of Annapolis like Joshua J. Cohen, or a Congressman like Clement Dorsey, John Leeds Kerr, Alexander Contee Hanson, or Frederick Stone.
Or be a Governor or Maryland like Emerson Harrington, Francis Thomas or Daniel Martin, or Governor of Nebraska like Keith Neville.
Or a world leader like Arturs Krišjānis Kariņš, Prime Minister of Latvia, 2019-2023 or Lucy Tamlyn, U.S. Ambassador to Benin.
You can put California Wine on the world stage like Warren Winiarski, founder of Stag’s Leap Wine Cellars, and the Johnnies who followed him, the makers of Decoy, Duckhorn and Turley.
You could be a lawyer and become Attorney General of the United States like Reverdy Johnson or William Pinkney.
You could be a doctor and become Surgeon General like Thomas Parran Jr. or be a physician like Tobias Watkins who was also the 4th Auditor of the United States Treasury.
You can make an impact with your words like Michael Anton, writer; former Deputy Assistant to the President for Strategic Communications, Ken Baumann, writer, publisher, and former actor, William Kowalski, author, Eddie’s Bastard, Somewhere South of Here, The Adventures of Flash Jackson, The Good Neighbor, Andrew Krivak, author, National Book Award nominee for The Sojourn, Tony Lagouranis, activist and author of Fear Up Harsh: An Army Interrogator’s Dark Journey through Iraq, Salvatore Scibona, author of “The End” a 2008 National Book Award finalist, named one of “20 under 40” notable authors by The New Yorker in 2010 or Cecelia Watson, alumna and author of Semicolon: The Past, Present, and Future of a Misunderstood Mark or writers Jennifer Wright or John C. Wright.
Be a leading liberal like Lydia Polgreen, Editor-in-Chief for The Huffington Post, 2006 winner of the George Polk Award. Or a leading conservative like Seth Cropsey, Director of the Center for American Seapower at the Hudson Institute and regular contributor to the National Review or Robert A. George, journalist and news columnist. Or aim for objective journalism like Danny Hakim, investigative journalist at The New York Times, or National Public Radio host Lisa Simeone.
You could be a physicist like Cynthia Keppel or Aron Wall, awarded the 2019 Breakthrough New Horizons in Physics Prize for fundamental insights about quantum information, quantum field theory and gravity.
You can make amazing food Daniel Rose (chef) Chef with restaurants in Paris (Spring, La Bourse et la Vie) and New York City (Le Coucou) or Miyoko Schinner, American chef, cookbook author, animal sanctuary founder and owner of cheese brand Miyoko’s Creamery
You can go on to create knowledge and make an impact in education like Rogers Albritton who served as the chairman of both Harvard and UCLA’s philosophy departments, Amber E. Boydstun, a political scientist and data scientist, John Bremer, educator/philosopher/author, philosopher Graham Harman, intellectual historian Wilfred McClay, psychiatrist and neuroscientist Pamela Sklar, O. Carter Snead, legal scholar and bioethicist, or Louis Leo Snyder, German scholar and historian.
Make an impact in theology like Thomas Altizer, theologian, author of The Gospel of Christian Atheism, or Mark D. Jordan, Andrew Mellon Professor, Harvard Divinity School.
Lead in higher education like Ben Sasse, president, University of Florida or Joseph Himmel, Jesuit missionary and president of Georgetown University. Or be a thinker like Tom Palmer, Senior Fellow at the Cato Institute.
Be a poet like Ange Mlinko, Guggenheim Fellow, Poetry Editor of the Nation
Or a businessman like Austin Ligon, co-founder/CEO of CarMax, Inc. or James T. Woodward, banker and owner of a major Thoroughbred horse dynasty, Eugene V. Thaw, American art dealer and collector or Kenneth Kronberg, a printing company owner.
