molly.com
Wednesday 22 October 2003
my generation
Yesterday, I spoke to a Web design class at the University of Arizona School of Art. Now, I’ve done teaching over the past years within the academic realm, but always at night, and mostly to a more mature group.
It was rather daunting to see just how impossibly young today’s college student is. Out of about 25 kids maybe 4 of them were truly there to learn something. The rest were sleeping off lunch or talking to friends while I was giving my presentation.
Was I that young in college? Were you? Were you that silly? That disrespectful? Have we just crossed the line into old? Or maybe you’re a college student now and have a different perspective.
Despite a light-hearted nature, I don’t think I was ever like that, least not by the time I got to college. College for me was always a privilege, something that was in fact a privilege for kids in my generation. Sure, I was encouraged by my family to seek out education, but judging by my experience yesterday, today’s student in general seems to think that college is just an extension of high school.
Filed under: general
Posted by: site admin | 4:53 am |
October 22nd, 2003 at 4:12 am
Reading what you have said is not shocking to me, it is what I have been seeing this for the last few years in two metro areas across the nation. I recently moved out of a college neighborhood in Orlando to Minneapolis, I lived there for two years. Noticing how the students studied, or partied more like it.
I am a college student, but I want to learn and it took me 5 years to realize that education means just a little bit more than, social status. Unfortunately, what you have described, Molly, is how the majority of the top schools are. It seems like everything is falling apart from the inside out. Who’s at fault? You? Me? Their parents? Who went wrong and where? Is there time to turn things around, or make a difference in this world?
I will start doing my part by praying to God in heaven through faith in Jesus. Are the foundations of this country no longer important? Do we just do what we can to be “good” people, I hope not. There is a lack of wisdom among us all, seek truth and it shall be revealed to you. Don’t seek truth, and the consequences are already being revealed through what Molly has written.
Brian Tima
October 22nd, 2003 at 8:46 am
I think it’s a sign of society’s outlook. Today, less importance is given to how much a person knows, and more to whether that person has a “certificate” or “degree”. I know people who came out of college with a degree, and are still dumb as a bag of hammers.
They were fired from their first two or three jobs (that they got with impressive academic papers) and are now sitting out their unemployment.
Many companies don’t have the time or resources to actually find out what an applicant is truly worth to them, so they rely on degrees and such - that’s also part of the problem. Most of these kids know that, and just coast through their studies or take only what’s necessary to achieve that degree.
It’s a shame. Sorry you were disrespected.
October 22nd, 2003 at 9:30 am
Well, your poll lacked a CowboyNeal protest option, or an option which fit me, but since I started sneaking into courses at the UofA when I was 14, and have watched both the teachers and students slip over 17 years, I’ll throw out an idea/opinion/worthless piece of drivel.
College used to be the province of the wealthy, hard working minds, or extremely gifted. Not just the students, but the teachers, also. Since this (college education) was an item with non-commodity value, there were expectations both set, and honored, by those involved in the process.
In a public policy effort to advance american education, a college education had to be readily obtainable by a greater number of people. This resulted in lower admissions standards, and lower teaching standards. American colleges are rapidly becoming the Wal-Marts of education… sure, it’s a cheap, working, product, but it’s nothing to brag about.
The class sizes have grown, overall quality standards have dropped, and students are actually bold enough to demand better grades because (get this) they’re *paying* to go to college.
That rant aside, I would set some ground rules, not unlike the ground rules of a “substitute teacher”… i.e. If someone is talking to their friends, ask them to leave. Kicking one out can grab attention fast. Of course, in today’s atmosphere, they may sue you for “impeding their education…” *sigh*
October 22nd, 2003 at 11:37 am
Two words: white shirt.
I’m with you though… I’ve been saying exactly that even since I was in college myself. Way too many of the kids are there wasting their parents’ and the taxpayers’ money because college is simply grades 13-16 to them. They’re not in school because they have a desire to learn anything, but because they feel like they have to be there.
Ron’s on the money, too. If people are carrying on full-on conversations during your lecture, I say chuck ‘em. You may go from 25 to 23 people in the class, but I guarantee that you’ll have more than four people paying at least some attention to you.
October 22nd, 2003 at 12:40 pm
One mitigation is that, when we think about how we were in college, we’re “remembering” how we saw ourselves then. There’s a number of degrees of separation there: the validity of our own self-perception at that time, the accuracy of our memory, and our current estimation of that perception. If we were to see a videotape of ourselves then, we might decide, now, that we were more disrespectful than we thought/remember.
Having said that, I agree with the trend. At my training company, I have noticed something of a spiral with the younger crowd over the past few years. Who knows how many factors go into it, but part of it is most definitely a cultural malaise that grows stronger in our youth each year. Overall, it seems that apathy grows, and when you try to make them care, it is seen as highly offensive and intrusive to them. It seems like the default position has shifted from “Pay attention to things” to “Pay attention to the things that earn your attention.”
This is very annoying when it expresses itself. Just last month, I had a student who thought nothing of turning around and starting up conversations in a normal tone of voice during a lecture portion. That kind of thing (cell phone, chatting, etc.) is more common now — was almost unheard of when I began teaching.
October 22nd, 2003 at 12:44 pm
This is a really good case for the “electro-shock” student desk. Students not paying attention? Zzzzzap! Digestion moving a little too slowly after that gut-bomb burrito? Zzzzzzap! Nobody raising their hands during the Q&A period? Zzzzzzap! Student in row 4 with a wireless PDA doing some power gaming between slides? Zzzzzzap!
Where are my Zimbardo Papers? They must be here somewhere…maybe in the box with my bell bottoms, dashiki, and Psych 101 textbook.
OK…maybe not…what about this: if they’re paying you, who cares if the “Wagon Wheel of Financial Entropy and Apathy” turns by one more spoke and rewards you, assuming you are not the one who turned it, but merely a prairie dog jumping out of the way? (I think I like these Old West money metaphors.) And, if you take the money and use it for a higher purpose, do you increase or decrease the amount of trail dust entropy? Well, sadly, it increases, since any global order you create or knowledge you impart to would-be-notwebdesigners is probably less than the state of the resulting disorganization of the money you have received after it has passed through many ornately-decorated stage coach strong boxes.
So, there you go. Smile and enjoy it, and next time, add more naked pictures and drug culture references to your presentation so that it is suitably fascinating to the visceral protein entities. You could even call the title of the new presentation: “Pulp Scriptin’” and then, with increasingly oblique and surreal Neo-Old Western symbolism, threaten to “David Lynch” anyone who doesn’t pay attention and require that they refer to detailed server records as “The Log Lady.”
After all, Art must be satisfied.
OK…but in a more serious vein and academic self-responsibility aside, you can help improve the hit ratio by making sure that your presentation is tailored for your audience. I think you are right in assuming that the presentations you give to mature evening students and nearly-non-teenage college students are somewhat different. So, the challenge is not only to present the material, but also to do it in a way that is both interesting and fun. Spark life into those media-dulled neurons and you will be rewarded with deserved presentorial appreciation, or perhaps at least one eyelid remaining open. Good luck.
October 22nd, 2003 at 12:55 pm
Come and talk at my university (Loughborough Uni UK) and I’ll sit and listen!
October 23rd, 2003 at 6:40 am
“This is a really good case for the “electro-shock” student desk.”
Oh PLEASE!
I’ll pay anything! Really!
Molly,
I’m sorry that you dealt with that, but I’m afraid it won’t be the last time. I have the advantage(?) of teaching as an independant computer trainer and have a little leyway on dealing with rude people.
My best friend however, had to teach a class at Yale over the summer and almost killed someone. She discribed the behavior of the students and it made me sick!
Were we raised differently? I don’t feel old (ok,ok I’ll be 35 in December which probably makes me an adult)until I teach a public class with some cutel little slip of a 20 year old who doesn’t get some of my TV and music references because that was “her Moms stuff”.
October 23rd, 2003 at 7:18 am
I shudder to think that I have more to say on this subject, but I do.
Personally, I don’t think that there is any difference today vs. 40 years ago with respect to the amount of attention humans pay to the things that go on around them no matter where they are. Technology is different; information and access are more ubiquitous and different; the phenotype of the world appears different, but killing, starvation, and disease are the same everywhere; and basic human nature is the same, skating on a thin veneer of socialization. However, it’s true that in 1963, the Pet Rock had not yet been born. Only a future generation would be changed forever. *moment of abject silence, except for those obnoxiously loud people talking on their cell phones*
The same fractions of humanity exist in all decades and ages - those who care and those who do not; those who are present to learn and those who are present to play at someone else’s expense or take advantage of the helpless; those who excel and those who fail and eventually drop out, etc. Students not paying attention in class on one day in one place for one lecture by any one person is not symptomatic of anything other than exactly that. Just take solace in the fact that the Pet Rock probably gave you its undivided attention, but perhaps only because it doesn’t know how to divide.
Drawing sweeping conclusions about the state of academia based on this experience is statistical folly and further invoking subjective memory is a repeating, generationally-flawed, pedantic equivocation. When I was your age, I had to lick the road clean with my tongue and dry the dishes with day-old bread! You kids today and your Pet Rock ‘n Roll. It’s devil music!
We have all had both great and terrible classes. We have all had thought-provoking and inane material in various classes. We have all had exciting and boring professors and would have rather rammed henna-stained porcupine quills through an overripe melon with a radio hidden inside than pay attention for whatever reason. OK…well…perhaps your preferred diversion is different from mine. Suit yourself.
Here is an actual quotation from one of my former calculus professors: “Mathematics is like chicken tracks. If you can follow the tracks, then you know where the chicken has been.” (He pronounced “been” like “bean.”) The day I heard those words with that inflection was the day I changed calculus sections. *yawn* Wiley Coyote….Suuuuuuper Geeeeeeeenius. (I pronounce “genius” like “beanius.”) I think my Pet Rock just smiled. Can they do that?
So, if professional lecturing is your job, then do it well and own both the failures and successes. Know your audience *before* you get there with strategic recon; provide firm but open leadership for the class to establish the lay of the land; then find the intellectual harmonics that resonate among the material, your presentation, the students, and their interests. Set limits for the class and adjust your response within those limits to preserve what you consider acceptable compromise to achieve the fundamental goal of learning. Isn’t that why you are there?
Don’t whine that students were rude after the fact when things don’t go the way you hoped they’d go - learn from it. That is not judgmental or mean-spirited - it’s just pragmatic. We have all had experiences where things didn’t go as we expected. Suck it up and do things differently next time and pray it wasn’t a money shot.
Unless you’re incredibly famous (or narcissistic and delusional), it’s unlikely that your class will view you with the reverence of the Pope in the first 5 minutes. However, by the end of an hour, if you have done your job, they should have a measure of respect for you and a new understanding of the material at hand.
Well…this is true except for the Pet Rock. Its understanding will be exactly the same as when you began the lecture. That’s why Pet Rocks are so dependable as experimental controls and I PRAY TO GOD that one day mine will smile. In fact, maybe it’s smiling now, just too slowly for me to observe. After all, at a quantum level, my Pet Rock is alive! *snoopy dance*
October 23rd, 2003 at 9:31 am
WHAT . . .EVER! Obviously this guy’s attention span is incessant. What an annoying diatribe.
Not to mention that he’s absolutely wrong. I am here to tell you that I have ADD myself. But I certainly have respect for someone trying to teach or share something with me.
People everywhere particularly people who spend mass quantities of time online have shrinking attention spans. We live in a world of drive-thru eateries, liquor stores, drug stores, and even banking. We don’t even have time to deal with another person in banking. A kiosk will do just fine. Give it to me in a millisecond, an mpeg, a sound byte, a sneak preview, Superbowl commercial, a spray on tan in one minute. How much can we fit into a miniscule amount of time?
Of course people today have far less of an attention span! Duh, that’s not just the anthropology of contemporary American society, its a pop art way of life.
P.S. By the way Mr. Davey Jones, Molly actually IS famous you dope.
October 23rd, 2003 at 9:54 am
I don’t think kids are any worse today than they were when we were their age. I think, as we get older we have a tendency to forget the worst of our own behaviour from the past. If you asked any of the students from your class about their attitude, they would probably claim to have a light-hearted nature, and didn’t mean any disrespect.
I used to teach 16 to 23 year olds during the day, and adults of an evening (21+). The adults were less challenging, as they all wanted to learn. The mature students had usually paid for the course with their own money, or were sponsored by their company. Either way, they had enough motivation to learn without psychology tricks.
The youngsters were more challenging, as most of them didn’t want to be there. A small minority of them didn’t want to be there because they have been ill-advised career-wise, but most didn’t want to be there because they’re at an age where sex, intoxication, friends, and life are that much more interesting than College. I was like that at that age. Can anyone honestly say they weren’t? At nearly 40, I’m still like that. Of course, I hide it from my Mum and Dad, although they’re curious as to what I’m going to be when I grow up.
October 23rd, 2003 at 10:26 am
I fear the lack of respect extends beyond just education, but into the job market as well. Whenever I’ve applied for a job, I’ve always worn a suit and tie. I assumed this was a given. Sadly, when I became an art director some years ago, I noticed that I was alone in this archaic tradition.
Every graphic artist and illustrator that ever applied for a job with me, save one shining example from Israel, wore jeans to job interviews. Women and men alike. Many even wore ratty concert shirts.
The first question out of their mouths was rarely in regards to benefit packages or goals. No, it was, “Do I have to dress up for this?”
October 23rd, 2003 at 12:41 pm
This is interesting, because I was just hearing the other day about some woman answering a cell phone during a proctored exam. I wonder if this type of behavior is less reflective of any particular age group than it is of the present state of American culture as a whole. That total sense of self absorption and entitlement by the kind of people who make phone calls from bathrooms (I always flush when someone does that) or people who call roadside assistance from a gas station because they ran out of gas and don’t want to pay for it. I remember college as sort of an irreverant give and take. We tended to interrupt a bit or get a little overenthused at times, but it was always inthe context of class discussion and contributed to the learning process. Then again, I’m a Gen X’r and most of us ended up dropping out , so I don’t know if any of it was ultimately of value or not. Certainly taught me how to conduct an intellectual argument, anyway.
November 2nd, 2003 at 10:05 am
Well, as Molly’s brother, I listen with rapt attention every time she opens her mouth. But as a person who has to enter the classroom from time to time myself, I know that such awe is rare in audiences.
However, my students - who this semester are all 18 year old freshmen and women - are surprisingly good students. This isn’t to say they aren’t sometimes sleepy or don’t sometimes have a side conversation going on now and then, but I’ve seen such behavior at faculty meetings among people who should have retired years ago, so I don’t think it’s a generational thing. In fact, I’m often taken aback at how polite and inquisitive these kids are, considering their age and all the distractions around them. In fact, it’s possible that the older students get the more disrespectful they are, as I have found juniors and seniors to be much more cavalier about class. Possibly this is the situation because I’m at UCLA and it’s supposed to be a better level of student. But it’s actually much harder to get into a decent college these days then when we were going to school. I think it’s possible that you just gave your talk at a bad time or that the professor did not appropriately prepare the class for your presentation. One of the things I continually do with students at this level is ask them what they expect to be getting out of the day’s lecture or presentation. Once forced to determine that for themselves, and with some leeway for the expected jokes about leaving, I find that they actually make responsible decisions and become more engaged.
But then again, U of A students are mostly little buggers anyways.
But, as a reminder of context I will share with you this: I have come across a letter from William James to Henry Adams in which James complains that his students are dumb and unmotivated. I just study American history, but I’m sure I can find similar quotes from the ancient Romans. We always seem to complain about how slack our youth are about their education.
November 11th, 2003 at 10:20 am
I sympathize:
I also teach in an AZ College. This semester has been very challenging for me and makes me re-think after 30 years, what impact I can possibly be having.
Student 1 is male, 19 and can’t stay awake. In a small art history lecture room, 9:05am class(30 seats) while taking attendance, his head is tilted back, eyes closed and his mouth is gaping open. The view from the front is unforgettable.
I ask him to leave. He does the surprised 7th grader look “Who me?” He tells me he is just not a “morning person”.
I am prepared, on time, and use creative techniques that involve students with their art classes. Someone out there tell me what does it mean to be a student today?
Maybe they are just not ready???? Help.
November 12th, 2003 at 12:44 pm
I’ve noticed a big difference in work ethics from my peers to a younger generation (approximately 10 years). When I started work as a temp 11 years ago I went out of my way to make sure that my appointed duties were kept up to date and where possible I would go looking for extra work. Some of the office temps we employ now need to be watched like hawks for every minute of the working day or they would sit and text their friends instead of looking for more work, and even worse not getting through their duties. When you politely ask them to get on with their work you get a look that would wither a cactus plant or more annoyingly the rolling of the eyes or snigger with friends.
When I first had my job I valued it and wanted it, it seems that now a job is a hindrance and chore. I smile though, when we get “I’ll just get a job elsewhere”, sure, but don’t forget that you need a reference from that Team Leader who you just back chatted for the last 10 minutes.
November 14th, 2003 at 5:56 am
Amen Brian Tima…
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