Hao, Jiayin: Beloit List

The world is changing. People can see the differences and similarities in society by comparing students to older faculty. However, it is much easier to analyze the situation from an Internet perspective.

There are many differences between today’s students and older faculty. There is no doubt that people who were born before 1980 have different life values compared to people who were born in the Internet era. However, this disparity leads to student change. Older faculty don’t have the tech tools to teach so that it is possible for students to miss words during the class lectures because they are playing their iPhones or Macs. People born before 1980 used only books and notebooks in class. Instead of these, students today use laptops to take notes and have Kindle to read books. Both are much more convenient and save time and energy. Even so, there still are disadvantages to technology. Some students use Facebook and Twitter during class. Sometimes, their cell phones ring during class. It seems like students today acquire knowledge more from technology and less from time spent in class. Even the attitude of going to school has changed. In the past, many students didn’t have enough motivation to go to school. It was not a big deal if they stayed at home instead of going to school every day. Nowadays, it seems like a regular and certain thing to accept education and go to class. Society is making progress. Also, knowledge itself keeps changing and self-correcting over time. The things that happened during the lives of older faculty have become a part of history.

On the other hand, there are some similarities between the past and now. The purposes for attending school are still the same. It is to achieve a better future, although students now use different tools when they study. It is always exciting for them to try new things. Older faculty were curious and desired to computers but they were primitive. Nowadays, students use iPads in class and look forward the next generation of the iPhone. The passion for new stuff is always the same. All students like to try new things. Also, communication between the teacher and the students are quite similar. Although students use e-mails and Blackboard to connect with teachers, face-to-face talking is still the most common and important way to ask help and questions of your teacher.

Education is making progress. It is a good thing to adapt to a changing world. For students who study in today’s schools, it is important to learn the past time and to take advantage of the new hi-tech products. In this way, students will study better.

Walton, Arain: Beloit List

Faculty born before 1980 and students born around 1993 are very different in their mindsets and ideas about technology and life in general. Social networking is a big deal for the students of 1993. They use Twitter, Myspace, and Facebook to start and end relationships. Nothing’s face-to-face anymore in the eyes of the professors. Professors faced books not used Facebook. Students want an instant reply to e-mails and messages, while faculty take as long as they want to respond to a message labeled “urgent!” Teachers are also finding that they see less and less of students because of online classes. Their languages are different too, many expressions have different meanings for both groups. For instance, one of the newest game systems is called a “Wii”, to a college professor that expression was used when going down a slide or swinging on the playground. Another example is the phrase, “Don’t touch that dial!” Students are still trying to figure out what dial because they have cell phones and computers. Life itself has changed. Students now face different crises than teachers did. While growing up students’ parents worried about mosquitoes or birds giving them a disease, while faculty members would just ignore a mosquito and keep going when they were growing up. Students are spoiled, they are used to bottled water and soda; half the time they don’t even make their own coffee but go to Starbucks! Professors don’t have the same social life as students. Students are less affected by the things they see on TV. For as long as they remember girls have been kissing each other and movie stars are all the craze. While students care about the latest thing on TV professors are more worried about whether their students’ homework is done.  Students and professors have grown up seeing and living to different ways.

Johnson, Morgan: Beloit List

The term “generation gap” refers to the differences between people of a younger generation and their elders. College students are now taught by men and women who are sometimes twice as old as their parents. Thus, students are inarguably at one side of the generation gap, especially when it comes to technology.

                   

As children of the 1990s, college students grew up during a technological boom. The Internet made its grand entrance along with cell phones, mp3 players, and DVD players. Daily life became much simpler. The graphing calculator made its debut in 1990, invoking a collective sigh of relief from math students everywhere. The advancement of technology has made many everyday tasks much easier, but has the seemingly harmonious marriage between students and technology actually interfered with education?

                  

 Dr. Kincaid, a math professor at Southern Arkansas University is a centrist on the subject. “There are both kinds of students. There are those who are using technology to a wonderful advantage, doing things beyond what I could’ve in my wildest dreams.” But she also recognizes the group of students who only see technology as a toy and “don’t see the value for intellectual development."

                   

The growing dependence on technology is also a cause for concern. Most professors see the addition as a curse. Calculators, for example, are an incredibly important development in education. But they have spawned concern that students depend on calculators so much that their critical thinking abilities are not being developed, because now a calculator can think critically for them.

                 

Another concern that did not exist 15 years ago was the abuse of cell phones in the classroom. Described as “rampant” across campus, Dr. Kincaid believes that the dependence on phones as a connection between friends is detrimental. “If students can’t make good decisions about when to sit in class and pay attention to what’s going on, if students are so afraid that they will miss a text from a friend, that’s a problem, and that is huge.”

                  

 The change of technology from one generation to another has also changed the expectations in the classroom. Now that students have literally and infinite amount of resources right at their fingertips, professors expect them to take advantage. “They have higher expectations for us, because of our resources. We don’t really have an excuse not to be able to do the things they never could as students.” Says Majesta Miles, a junior.

                  

Teachers now expect students to utilize their instant access to decode problems they don’t understand: a quick dictionary lookup for a new word in British Lit, or studying a website of facts about the periodic table for chemistry. Students now have innumerable amounts of knowledge ready at the touch of a button or the tap of a finger. “Whereas professors only had the books they could find in their libraries.” Says James Schlag, a junior. “They didn’t have so many sources readily available.”

                  

 Professors ask now that students use their technology to aid their education. A reasonable request: the request that students use their smart phones to actually make them smarter. It looks as though technology and the way it is being used can be shown as solid evidence of the generation gap between students and professors. But it doesn’t have to be a barrier between the two. Rather, it shows the incredible difference of the daily routines and mindsets of the youth and elders.

                 

In Dr. Kincaid’s words, “The world we live in is a changing environment and none of us have figured it out yet.” So it seems no matter when the generation, there will always be the gap.

Beavers, Michelle: Beloit List

Today’s new and hot toy might be old and boring in a month. A new, more advanced toy probably replaced it.  Throughout time, generations have seen many changes in social and technological advances. To the current generation a cell phone is useless if it does not come with an Internet connection and texting. People born before the 1980s have had to learn how to text and never imagined that cell phones with Internet connections might ever exist. While current generations are born into a more technologically advanced world, older generations struggle to keep up. The differences, similarities, and opinions of the two generations, current and born before the 1980s, are expressed in The Chronicle of Higher Education: “The 2011 Mind-set of Faculty (Born Before 1980)” and “The Beloit College Mind –Set List Welcomes the ‘Internet Class.’” 

             

The Chronicle of Higher Education had readers who agreed and disagreed with the articles written. In “The Beloit College Mind –Set List Welcomes the ‘Internet Class’” Wendy Kloiber and John Tomlinson disagreed with item number four on the list: “The only significant labor disputes in their lifetimes have been in major-league sports.” John says the statement is false and Wendy expressed frustration in the comment about the statement. However, Teria Rogers and drjeff are encouraging the list by adding on their statements that fit right in.  Teria states, “76. (Adding onto 75.) Newspapers, who reads those???” and drjeff writes, “76. They told their parents ‘all my friends have cell phones’ when they were 5.” In “The 2011 Mind-set of Faculty (Born Before 1980),” many readers commented on how they perceived Mr. Krajewski, the author, as being bitter, and took offense to statements in the article. Very few saw humor or agreed with what Mr. Krajewski was writing.

             

The Chronicle of Higher Education articles focused on two different points of view. “The 2011 Mind-set of Faculty (Born Before 1980)” focused on the teacher and professor aspect. This article expresses how professors and teachers are now expected to do more while getting the same or less pay than years before. Therefore, some need to take up a part-time job to pay the bills. They are also expected to keep up with new technological advances that are becoming more and more popular, such as Power-Point and online classes. “The Beloit College Mind –Set List Welcomes the ‘Internet Class’” focuses on the student’s perspective. The current student generation has always had multiple channels on TV and the Internet on cell phones. During their lifetimes, having girls as altar servers and seeing a person in an electric car driving down the street is an everyday occurrence. A teacher who does not keep up with the technological advances of the newer generation is considered old and out of date. Technological and social advances that have taken place over the years have separated these two generations. The Chronicle of Higher Education articles point out these differences and try to help the two generations have a better understanding of each other.

             

The Chronicle of Higher Education: “The 2011 Mind-set of Faculty (Born Before 1980)” and “The Beloit College Mind –Set List Welcomes the ‘Internet Class’” express similarities and differences in the current generation and the generation born before the 1980s. Technological and social advances separate the two generations from each other. These articles are meant to help close the gap that separates the generations.  Each article focuses on only one generation, expressing that generation’s point of view. Both articles have readers who agree and disagree with certain statements. Opinions will always differ between generations due to the difference of lifestyles. Some people have chosen to keep up with technology and some have not. After all, the world is constantly changing, so what is new today, just might be old tomorrow.

Sorsby, Taryn: Beloit List

What is the difference between an instructor and a student? Is it age, experience, tenure, or environment? It’s my firm belief that while both share common concepts, all are individuals. The two links assigned give different views: one illustrates how students feel about teachers, the other of what the teachers should expect of incoming students. The truth is these articles are in some ways inadequate, for they list things that aren’t always factual. Though the gap between learners and teachers is vast, there are still ways in which the two can connect.

As a child born in 1993, I’ve always had access to computers and other technology. Now that the Internet is faster and more efficient that ever before, most teachers say that this year’s freshmen have had it better off than those before. “They are the first college freshmen to grow up taking the word ‘online’ for granted,” - Ron Nief and Tom McBride. But what these authors fail to understand is that my generation is, in no way, taking the Internet for granted. Our whole country is centered on innovation. Innovation leads to 18-year-olds having 24 hour access to the entire world via almost any kind of technological device. To say today's students are abusing that privilege is to say that the first students who had access to desktop computers, libraries, typewriters, and historically influential speeches also did the same. Today students just have more access to those resources than students before. In this way, both are the same. The difference is the extent of the technology now available compared to what it was before.

The Beloit College List states, “Andre the Giant… [has] always been dead.” for this year’s freshmen. I wasn’t aware he’d died until a few years ago. I grew up watching The Princess Bride, and it never occurred to me to look into whether Andre was still alive. I may be at fault for having thought something false, but so are the designers of the Beloit College Mind-Set List for assuming such things of my generation. Here is another example, “Refer to LBJ, and they might assume you're talking about LeBron James.” It seems that I’m supposed to know who LeBron James is because of my age. I know he’s an athlete, but I couldn’t tell you what sport. I do, however, know who Lyndon B. Johnson is. If I asked who Justin Beiber or Mark Zuckerberg was, would any of my professors know? Older generations know things the younger ones don’t and younger generations to know things the older ones don’t. All generations are the same in that they can be naive about each others facts. The difference is that older generations are not required to learn about the present while the younger ones are forced to take classes to learn about the past.

I understand that this list isn’t made to offend freshmen, but rather give insight to the teachers about the incoming class. Still, I believe we deserve a little more benefit of a doubt.  How my generation sees the world is completely different than how older generations see it. What I see as normal, such as celebrity trials, others see as momentous. Though a wide information gap exists between the generations, they still share the same advantages such as access to information. Professors just need to be more mindful of student knowledge, and students need to be able to connect more with their instructors.

Duke, Taylor: Beloit List

Most people my age have an iPhone.   An iPhone is a device that allows access to the Internet with the click of a button or to write a text message by tapping on a touch screen.  My best friend, my boyfriend, and my roommate each have one and use them as their lifeline. Without them they would be lost in a dark abyss, far away from society.  But I’m doing just fine without a “smart phone” and so are many of the people I rely on to give me a quality education.

             

The generation that includes many of my professors is more apt to have students read from an outdated textbook or e-mail them instead of presenting a PowerPoint presentation or posting on their Facebook walls.  According to Bruce Krajewski, “[older] faculty members are regarded by many parents, administrators, and state legislators as lazy, inefficient, and unaccountable. If it were not for all the work the faculty members must do, they would have the time to live down to those expectations” (The 2011 Mind-Set of Faculty (Born Before 1980)).  Krajewski makes a valid argument basically stating that if these faculty members did not take the time to teach and refer back to other forms of technology other than Internet and “Blackboard,” then a sense of hard work would be lost in today’s learning system.  Blackboard and PowerPoint’s provide an easy source of knowledge, but when students look for something and take the time to do the research without receiving it at the touch of a button, they feel a sense of accomplishment.  Also, the professors are doing their part in guaranteeing that their students do not become lazy and rely on technological advances to do everything for them. 

           

On the other end of the spectrum, the current generation is still experiencing the early stages of 21^st century technology and learning as it grows, step by step.  Really, they are not that different from their elders when it comes to growing and living in the same, ever-changing environment.  Many of my teachers have iPhones and I do not.  What does that say about society?  It simply implies that the “Internet Class” (Beloit College Mind-Set List) and the older generation are very similar.  The only real differences are taste and methods of teaching.  According to Don Troop, “their [students] schools’ ‘blackboards’ have always been getting smarter” (Beloit College Mind-Set List).  Professors born before 1980 are more likely to use a dry-erase board, cart projector, or a chalkboard rather than a Smart Technologies Smartboard, tablet, or hanging projector.  But, in all cases students are being taught the same material.

 I had the opportunity to ask my mother if she thought professors expected too much of their students.  She replied that sometimes professors can expect too much because they depend on students already to have computers or other latest technology on which to do a lot of their homework and studies, and professors rely on them to look up too much information on the Internet rather than lecturing and referring to textbooks.   I believe that a lot of what she says is true.  My classmates and I are easily stressed as we try to complete the most impossible of tasks and breathe a sigh of relief when we receive a “satisfactory” grade.  These satisfactory grades cause professors to believe we are just lazy and do not use technology wisely.  When will professors realize that they are expecting too much when they see their students are not doing well in class?  As technology exceeds expectations, students fall short of their professor’s.  The iGap becomes more prominent and more problems evolve. 

Guy, Lacey: Beloit List

As the Beloit List points out, older faculty and today’s students differ in so many ways. Being on campus, both have to learn how to communicate with each other effectively. For example, teaching students in a way that is completely foreign to them would most likely be less effective than a more modern technique. The students also have to learn how to communicate with their professors without seeming uneducated. This process goes on every day because students and faculty are always trying to keep up with each other. Most of the differences between them come from the different lifestyles they have led.

             

The biggest dissimilarity between the two would most definitely be technology. Students are now doing almost all their work on computers. This pushes professors to have to “get with the program” and update all their teaching materials and techniques to involve computers. Even though there still are teachers who only use books, those teachers most likely will retire soon. These kinds of teachers are still trying to figure out the difference between blackboards and the Blackboard website. While many older professors see technological communication as unreliable and unnecessary, they still have to adapt to the new technologies to keep up with their students.

             

Most professors have the upper hand over students when it comes to knowledge of history and world events. Students may know more about celebrities and gossip, but the older faculty members have greater knowledge about basic facts.  For example, when asked who Arnold Palmer is, older staff would answer with one of the greatest golfers of all time, but students would refer to the lemonade brand. Teachers would most likely argue that Arnold Palmer is an important figure in history, but the students would simply shrug. This example demonstrates a huge difference between the two different groups. Each group judges the importance of news items differently and only professors seem to care about the past.

             

Another difference between today’s students and older faculty is lifestyles. These two groups grew up in completely different decades, so they tend to have different preferences. When faculty members were growing up, they didn’t have all of the paranoia that today’s students do. The paranoia of student’s being on drugs is tremendously high. It is almost expected nowadays for a young adult to have at least tried some type of drug. When teachers were growing up, drugs were harder to get a hold of and prohibitions for their use were vigorously enforced. Even the little things, such as riding on the back of a truck or playing outside after dark, were taken more lightly then they are now. Of course the different lifestyles they had growing up affect their personalities and provide further differentiation.

             

The many differences between older faculty and students are never ending because every day something new is invented and both groups have to adapt in their own ways. Both have to come together to learn how to understand and communicate with each other in order to have a stable learning environment. Even though their differences are so large, it is possible to form unity.