Will "What they don't know" hurt them? I read a fun article in the Salt Lake Tribune last week that again made me face my age and reality. The article talked about an annual study called the “Beloit College Mindset List.” The list outlines 75 items that will help professors understand that the cultural references that are so prevalent in our lives will draw blank stares from their students, most of whom were born in 1992.
For students entering college this fall, email is too slow, phones have never had cords and Clint Eastwood is better known as a senstive director, rather than an action star. Unless they’ve seen it at their grandparents house, they have never seen a carousel of slides and their computers have always had a disk drive.
World events that had such an impact on our lives, barely register a paragraph in their history lessons or in their memories. For example, when the wall came down in Berlin it was a significant event in my life. I’m sure I paid more attention to that event because my parents both emigrated from East Germany. I was in Germany in 1990 at the CEBIT tradeshow in Hanover. Several of us rented a car and drove from Hanover to Berlin. Even though the wall was in the process of coming down and the borders were supposed to be more open, we still had to go through all the border checks, have our passports scrutinized.
We arrived in Berlin in mid-morning and proceeded to the Brandenburg Gate. At that place, the wall was still up. There were hammers and chisels laying all around. I was able to chisel off some chunks of the wall - which I still have. I have a picture of myself on the wall. It was a very interesting trip for me especially because of the family history with the country.
I mention this example specifically because I was 7 or 8 weeks pregnant with my daughter Elisha, who is currently in her second year at SLCC. I have had several opportunities to recall that trip to her and my other kids and they have taken my “Berlin Wall” rocks to school for their 6th grade country reports on Germany. I get a little smile on my face when my kids report to me that they were the only one in their class able to answer some historical trivia question that we had discussed at home.
Perhaps we should take the Beloit College list and make sure that our own children and grandchildren have a sense of the past. I’m pretty certain that they will look at us and roll their eyes - pretty much like we did when our own parents told us about walking to school in 3 feet of snow, uphills both ways.
Just for fun, quiz your kids or grandkids to find out their take on the world.
