[EAS]Class of '07 Mindset

[pjk]

Mail*Link¨ SMTP               Class of '07 Mindset

Dear Colleagues -

As we start another academic year, here is some insight into who our
freshmen are. Below is the mindset survey from Beloit College, as
forwarded by Rick Ries's TOMORROW'S PROFESSOR listserv. 

I also refer you to the (soberer) annual surveys done by the UCL
Higher Education Research Institute, about which I have written to
you previously
<http://jove.eng.yale.edu/pipermail/eas-info/2001/000297.html>.
Their latest report on freshmen (for 2002 though) is available at
<http://www.gseis.ucla.edu/heri/news_norms.html> for $25, but the
press release referred to at that URL contains much salient detail.

By the way, my own initial probes indicate that Monty Python
episodes, very valuable to me as a source of metaphors, still have
at least some currency.

All best,  --PJK

--------------------------------------
Date: 9/4/03 10:38 AM
From: Rick Reis
"The Mindset List, among other things, is a reminder of that world-a 
world that makes education a tougher yet more fascinating job than 
ever. In saying hello to the new generation, which they labor 
mightily to understand, but with mixed results, they are saying 
good-bye to themselves. There is something of wicked and addictive 
interest in that. I myself am part of that very generation. There is, 
for me, a bittersweet pleasure in knowing that Cherry Cokes didn't 
always come in cans and there are millions of first-year students who 
will never know how delicious it was when it didn't."
----------------------------------------------------------------------
		         TOMORROW'S PROFESSOR(SM) LISTSERV
	              "desk-top faculty development, one hundred times a year"
              Over 17,500 subscribers at over 550 academic 
institutions in 106 countries

			           Sponsored by
             THE STANFORD UNIVERSITY CENTER FOR TEACHING AND LEARNING
		                   http://ctl.stanford.edu
-----------------------------------------------------------------------
Folks:

One of the most popular postings on the TP Listserv over the years 
has been the annual "Beloit College Mindset List," that looks at 
today's college freshman and what they have and have not experienced 
in their short lifetimes.  The results are both useful and sobering 
for any professor over 30.  So here it is for the entering class of 
2003 who will graduate in 2007.

Regards,

Rick Reis
reis at stanford.edu
UP NEXT: Learning Civic Engagement without Diversity?

			          Tomorrow's Academy

	------------------------ 1,115 words ---------------------------

    BELOIT COLLEGE RELEASES THE MINDSET LIST FOR THE CLASS OF 2007

Ron Nief
niefr at beloit.edu

Beloit, Wis.-Across the nation, students are entering colleges and 
universities with their own perspectives on the times in which they 
live. Most of them were born in 1985.

For the sixth year, Beloit College has developed and distributed to 
the faculty and staff the "Beloit College Mindset List." According to 
co-editor Tom McBride, Keefer Professor of the Humanities at the 
Wisconsin liberal arts college, the list helps to slow the rapid 
onset of "hardening of the references," in the classroom.

McBride notes that "These entering students were born into a world 
that had developed a screening test for AIDS and where managed 
healthcare was gaining its first foothold. The Middle East had 
replaced the USSR and Eastern Europe as our greatest challenge to 
security. It is a generation which believes in technological 
innovations and solutions and where digital devices, pin numbers and 
calling cards are an integral part of their lives. Despite the fears 
associated with AIDS and divorce, we should remember that this is a 
generation that has grown up in a largely successful, prosperous 
society . . . I believe they are fascinated and vexed by the results 
of the world they have made," says Prof. McBride.

"The Mindset List, among other things, is a reminder of that world - 
a world that makes education a tougher yet more fascinating job than 
ever. In saying hello to the new generation, which they labor 
mightily to understand, but with mixed results, they are saying 
good-bye to themselves. There is something of wicked and addictive 
interest in that. I myself am part of that very generation. There is, 
for me, a bittersweet pleasure in knowing that Cherry Cokes didn't 
always come in cans and there are millions of first-year students who 
will never know how delicious it was when it didn't."

In April of the year the class of 2007 was born, Joseph Lelyveld 
complained in The New York Times that "conversations with some young 
people around the country about the war in Vietnam will find their 
impressions of it to be remarkably dim." High school juniors and 
seniors, could not identify Ho Chi Minh, Robert McNamara or the 
Chicago Seven.

In The New Yorker that year, it was noted that "Each generation 
brings a clean slate into the world. But the world itself is not a 
clean slate, and what happened before needs to be learned and 
remembered."

With the help of hundreds of people who have made contributions and 
after months of preparation, Beloit College is now pleased to present 
the Mindset List for the entering class.


	THE BELOIT COLLEGE MINDSET LIST FOR THE CLASS OF 2007¨


Most students entering college this fall were born in 1985:

1. Ricky Nelson, Richard Burton, Samantha Smith, Laura Ashley, Orson 
Welles, Karen Ann Quinlin, Benigno Aquino, and the U.S. Football 
League have always been dead.

2. They are not familiar with the source of that "Giant Sucking Sound."

3. Iraq has always been a problem.

4. "Ctrl + Alt + Del" is as basic as "ABC."

5. Paul Newman has always made salad dressing.

6. Pete Rose has always been a gambler.

7. Bert and Ernie are old enough to be their parents.

8. An automatic is a weapon, not a transmission.

9. Russian leaders have always looked like leaders everyplace else.

10. The snail darter has never been endangered.

11. There has always been a screening test for AIDS.

12. Gas has always been unleaded.

13. They never heard Howard Cosell call a game on ABC.

14. The United States has always had a Poet Laureate.

15. Garrison Keillor has always been live on public radio and 
Lawrence Welk has always been dead on public television.

16. Their families drove SUVs without "being fuelish."

17. There has always been some association between fried eggs and your brain.

18. They would never leave their calling card on someone's desk.

19. They have never been able to find the "return" key.

20. Computers have always fit in their backpacks.

21. Datsuns have never been made.

22. They have never gotten excited over a telegram, a long distance 
call, or a fax.

23. The Osmonds are just talk show hosts.

24. Undergraduate college athletes have always been a part of the NBA 
and NFL draft.

25. They have always "grazed" for food.

26. Three-point shots from "downtown" have always been a part of basketball.

27. Test tube babies are now having their own babies.

28. Stores have always had scanners at the checkout.

29. The Army has always driven Humvees.

30. Adam and PC Junior computers had vanished from the market before 
this generation went online.

31. The Statue of Liberty has always had a gleaming torch.

32. They have always had a pin number.

33. Banana Republic has always been a store, not a puppet government 
in Latin America.

34. Car detailing has always been available.

35. Directory assistance has never been free.

36. The Jaycees have always welcomed women as members.

37. There has always been Lean Cuisine.

38. They have always been able to fly Virgin Atlantic.

39. There have never been dress codes in restaurants.

40. Doctors have always had to deal with "reasonable and customary 
fees" and patients have always had controls placed on the number of 
days they could stay in a hospital.

41. They have always been able to make photocopies at home.

42. Michael Eisner has always been in charge of Disney.

43. They have always been able to make phone calls from planes.

44. Yuppies are almost as old as hippies.

45. Rupert Murdoch has always been an American citizen.

46. Strawberry Fields have always been in New York.

47. Rock and Roll has always been a force for social good.

48. Killer bees have always been swarming in the U.S.

49. They have never seen a First Lady in a fur coat.

50. Don Imus has always been offending someone in his national audience.


In all fairness it should be understood that students entering 
college this fall do have a few items on their own lists that will 
separate them from many of their mentors:

1. For many of them today, it's all about the "bling, bling."

2. They know who the "Heroes in a half shell" are.

3. Peeps are not a candy, they are your friends.

4. They have been "dissing"and "burning" things all their lives.

5. They can expect to get a ticket for "ricing out their wheels."

6. They knew how to pop a Popple and trade a Pog.

7. They can still sing the rap chorus to the "Fresh Prince of 
Bel-Air" and the theme song from "Duck Tales."


© 2002 Beloit College, Beloit, Wisconsin

---------------------------------------------------------------------
TOMORROW'S PROFESSOR LISTSERV is a shared mission partnership with the
American Association for Higher Education (AAHE) http://www.aahe.org/
The National Teaching and Learning Forum (NT&LF) http://www.ntlf.com/
The Stanford Center for Innovations in Learning (SCIL) 
http://scil.stanford.edu/
---------------------------------------------------------------------
NOTE: Anyone can SUBSCRIBE to Tomorrows-Professor Listserv by 
addressing an e-mail message to:
<Majordomo at lists.stanford.edu>

Do NOT put anything in the SUBJECT line but in the body of the message type:

			subscribe tomorrows-professor
---------------------------------------------------------------------
To UNSUBSCRIBE to the Tomorrows-Professor send the following e-mail
message
to: <Majordomo at lists.stanford.edu>

unsubscribe tomorrows-professor
----------------------------------------------------------------------