The Power and Unexpected Payoffs of Pitzer’s Liberal Arts Experience

What’s a good metaphor for the undergraduate liberal arts experience?

According to the Pitzer alumni, faculty, and students featured in the fall 2025 issue of The Participant, it’s a lot like hiking the trails of Yosemite—each path takes you to wonderful, often unexpected destinations.

Just how unexpected?

Consider the cover story on John Landgraf ’84. He arrived at Pitzer unsure of his direction, chose anthropology, thrived in the College’s intimate and intellectually vibrant environment… and has gone on to become an influential leader in television as the celebrated chair of the entertainment network FX.

Landgraf credits his success to following his passions—a common thread among NPR Tiny Desk video producer Maia Stern ’07, international baseball scout James Kang ’10, and the other alumni and students profiled in the issue.

In the new issue, readers also hear from Pitzer faculty on the merits and values of a liberal arts education—something best summed up by Philosophy Professor Brian Keeley, who explains that a liberal arts education “is meant to equip one for a life, not just a career.”

A feature on Assistant Professor of Media Studies Lisa Yin Han underscores another hallmark of the liberal arts—deep, interdisciplinary thinking. In her award-winning book Deepwater Alchemy, Han draws from media studies, science, technology, ocean mapping, linguistics, philosophy, and history to shed light on what interviewer Marc Weingarten describes as “a deep, dark mystery, unfathomably remote.”

Taken together, the stories featured in the new issue reveal what makes the liberal arts journey so transformative: it doesn’t just prepare students for the professional world—it prepares them to understand it, question it, and reshape it. At Pitzer, every trail leads to new ways of seeing and new possibilities that show students—past and current—where they can go next.

Read the new issue, including extended features and online extras:
https://www.pitzer.edu/participant