Four years, a stack of college credits and early scheduling aren't the only separations between seniors and freshmen.
Most students in the class of 2014 were born in 1992, and Beloit College in Beloit, Wis., released this year's "Mindset List" with the start of fall classes to help professors gauge cultural references freshmen may be too young to understand.
"The college class of 2014 reminds us, once again, that a generation comes and goes in the blink of our eyes, which are, like the rest of us, getting older and older," the report's introduction says.
In the "catalog of the rapidly changing worldview of each new generation," researchers identified 75 "cultural touchstones" about the class of 2014, and while some freshmen disagreed with a few items on the list, most rang true in the new Tigers' lives.
"I never had a phone with a cord," said Ryne Robert, a biochemistry freshman, agreeing with the list. "If I had one, I wasn't old enough to use it."
Robert, who was born in 1991, further confirmed the study's findings, saying he doesn't remember computers without a CD-ROM drive, never had less than 100 channels to surf on TV and didn't grow up with a wristwatch because he had a cell phone to check time.
Alana Sullivan, a marine biology freshman from New Orleans, responded "Who's Dirty Harry," when asked if she'd seen the classic Clint Eastwood movie. But, like the Mindset List found, she recognized Eastwood as a
director for his recent work in "Million Dollar Baby" and "Gran Torino" rather than as the classic western actor.
Sullivan, however, disagreed with the Mindset List's assertion these freshmen "seldom if ever use snail mail." She said she often "snail mails" her boyfriend, who is a Marine stationed now in North Carolina.
Karl Simmerman, a music graduate student who was born in 1988, said the list's findings didn't surprise him.
"Even with the things I grew up with, my 18-year-old sister doesn't get as a high school senior," Simmerman said.
Jacqueline Bach, an assistant professor of educational theory, policy and practice in the College of Education, said the list shows assumptions generations make about one another, and it's important for professors "to recognize the ways that students have learned to do things."
Giving context to foreign references and using current culture are important during the educational process, she said.
Brian Voss, vice chancellor for Information Technology and Chief Information Officer, said incoming freshmen view many technological advancements as "an invisible part of the fabric of their lives and daily activities" as new IT items, like smart phones, fade into the background as accepted parts of everyday life.
Voss said one of the list's findings, that "e-mail is just too slow" for freshmen, is true as "there is a wider gap" in e-mail use between freshmen and upperclassmen on campus.
"I can relate to this [list] very much, as my youngest is a sophomore in college this year," Voss said in an e-mail. "We never exchange e-mails, and if he calls, it's never from anything but his cell phone. And I've learned to exchange the age-old phrase ‘He never calls unless he needs money' for the phrases ‘He never texts unless he needs money' or ‘He only posts on my [Facebook] wall when he needs money.'"
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Contact Nicholas Persac at npersac@lsureveille.com
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