It’s 2019 and our incoming students are the first university class born this century. While we serve students from all age groups, most of our incoming freshman grew up very differently than most of us. For example, they were one year old when 9/11 happened and they’ve always had Wikipedia for “research.”
Here are some realities of our students born after the year 2000…
- Humans have always lived in space, not just traveled there.
- They have grown up afraid that a school shooting could happen.
- Same-sex marriage has always been legal somewhere.
- Oprah has always been a magazine.
- They never used a spitbowl in a dentist’s office.
- A visit to the bank is a rare event.
- Best-selling books have always been available on an e-reader.
Deep learning requires that we know our students and connect with them when we can. As the saying goes, “we teach students, not subjects.”
