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Connecting with Today's Students

By Graham B. Spanier

Remember 1997? Google had just been introduced. The price of a gallon of gas was about a dollar. President Bill Clinton had just begun his second term in office. And the Kellogg Commission on the Future of State and Land-Grant Universities released Returning to Our Roots: The Student Experience, which found "a critical need to reform undergraduate education" and to "focus on universities as genuine learning communities" that put students first.

As chair of the Kellogg Commission, I embraced that imperative and have worked to promote the notion of student-centeredness in higher education. Now, a dozen years later, we are faced with rising costs of operations, a changing competitive landscape, shifting demographics, reductions in state appropriations, increased pressures for accountability, and a widespread economic downturn.

Yet, a fundamental question remains unchanged: How do we balance our goal of living the vision of a student-centered university with our mission of advancing excellence in teaching, research, and service?

There are no easy answers, and generational differences among students, faculty, and administration present some challenges. In case you haven't noticed, we're not getting any younger. The average age of a university president is 60 years old, and retirement is within the sights of an estimated 6,000 higher education administrators who will need to be replaced annually through 2014. Although some may be busy attending retirement celebrations, we can't forget the need to find common ground with the 17 million students on college campuses today.

Today's Students

I have been in higher education administration for 32 years and am the father of two recent college graduates. I have found that learning about teenagers is a lot like programming a VCR—by the time you figure it out, everything has changed again.

So what have we learned about today's students, and how can we better connect with them?

Let's begin with time management. If you think there isn't enough time in a day, consider this: A recent study found that the average young person manages to pack 23 cumulative hours of activity into every 24-hour day. They do so by engaging in up to five activities at once, and they're not just walking and chewing gum. Seventy-seven percent send and receive text messages on mobile e-mail devices while driving a car, and 41 percent text while skiing, on horseback, riding a bicycle, or listening to a lecture in a college classroom. . . .

Excerpted from the fall 2009 issue of The Presidency. To subscribe to the magazine, please call (301) 632-6757, or order online through ACE's bookstore.