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| Photo taken from Heavy.com |
Our readings and class
discussion for the first week of school were based on past, present and future trends.
With an analysis of our changing culture and environment, the OECD look to
explain the future of education. My very basic understanding and experience
with trends would regularly come from the news, regarding small yet impactful
daily weather reports to more robust and influential predictions from
consultants and experts around climate, markets, and technology. Trends drive
new marketing, recruitment, retention, and educational strategies at work,
which can impact the work I do. To finally try out the expert role in my own
world and make predictions on trends that I see happening around me was
something new and was thought-provoking fun for our first class discussion.
I started in my position as
an academic advisor in my mid-20s. I felt close and relatable to the students.
I saw this as an advantage to the service I could provide and to my department.
Over the years as students got younger and I got older, this feeling of “us” subtly
shifted to “me” and “them.” I can no longer relate to their world, speak in
their generational tongue, or have insight to their high school experience.
Educational trends are said to move incredibly slow overtime which makes it all
the more challenging to predict and deliver new strategies and goals.
I shared with our class the
change in SFU’s student voice. Students are seemingly more complacent than
ever. This school was known for having a vocal student body, in its younger
years, who’d use their presence forcefully with demands in peaceful protests. They’d
form movements with a clear position. However, today students of SFU are seen to
be accepting of the status quo, unaware, or apathetic. In contrast to students
in Quebec, who have worked hard to keep tuition the lowest in Canada, our students
seem to have lost their voice entirely. I attempted to connect the dots between
now and then to understand this change and to understand the motives; perplexities
only grew. Days later I came to realized how blind I was to the actual current
state of our students. They are still forming and storming but it’s no longer
what we recognize as traditional demonstrations. Students are spreading
information fast and widely online. Nothing new here, but this has dramatically
shaped how students are making waves.
Young people are making
demands and impacts through social media. The Educational Advisory Board (EAB)
recently released the article “Navigating the New Wave of Student Activism.”
They seek to explain millennials and the future students of Generation Z. Trends
indicate the opposite to what I had assumed, as student activism is predicted
to only intensify. With the emergence of widespread access to the internet through
smart phones and the change in our lifestyles around these pocket computers, information
has been spreading rapidly for a long time and is only going moving quicker.
EAB identifies a number of impacts
from telecommunication developments. For one, campus matters are no longer
exclusive to their student, staff, and faculty, but have become matters involving
surrounding communities. Campus stories are gaining traction from off-campus populations
who identify with particular political views, cultural practices, historical experiences,
and backgrounds. Demands from students are changing and momentum is growing fast.
How schools adapt to these
changes will be unique with their response approach, messaging, communication,
follow up, and policy changes. Acknowledging the current situation and creating
accurate trends will allow schools to work better with students, eliminate
disturbances, and avoid drastic implications of student demonstrations. We're just days following
the historical Women’s March and it's clear that large groups of angry and
unsatisfied people will be a force to recon with and this new wave of student
activism shouldn’t be underestimated either.
EAB
(2017). Navigating the New Wave of Student Activism: A Briefing for Senior Institutional
Leaders. Retrieve at: https://www.eab.com/research-and-insights/student-affairs-forum/expert-insights/2017/navigating-the-new-wave
