Adapting to students

Reflect for a moment on how many conversations you've had with faculty and other colleagues where complaints about students was the central topic. Unfortunately, I've had far too many. My reaction to being part of these encounters has varied from ignoring it and hoping it will go away to defense of students, to adding my own complaints (just being honest).

The point is that those employed in higher education are often caught up in serving those for whom they have at least some modest disdain and these negative views often increase with the number of years educators have been in their career. Madeline St. Amour writes that helping faculty to adapt to changing demographics and attributes is a challenge. The disconnect is in some ways predictable for the nature of faculty (and some staff) is that they are at least one generation removed from current students' experiences or they come from a level of socio-economic privilege that resulted in a very different world view.

St. Amour provides examples of individuals and institutions striving to more effectively serve current students. The bottom line, especially with declining numbers of white and privileged students, is a commitment to student success for the more diverse students who now populate many campuses and programs.