Decoding the Beloit Mindset List

Typical of most years, Beloit College has announced its "Mindset List" for the collegiate class of 2020. Like most years, the Beloit list reflects the thoughts of its writers (all Boomer Generation) rather than our college incoming students (among the last of the Millennial Generation).

If you want to read Beloit's list, the link is here:

https://www.beloit.edu/mindset/2020/

If you want some listings a bit closer to the students (and how those of us beyond college connect with them), here are a few tidbits:

Students have never known a world with Frank Sinatra, Florence Joyner, Phil Hartman, Sonny Bono, Tammy Wynette, Stokely Carmichael/Kwame Ture, or Carl Wilson.

Students have always been able to Google something.

Students don’t remember a world without Facebook.

The only connection students have to Camelot is Caroline Kennedy Schlossberg.

Donald Trump has always been involved in bankruptcy action. Hillary Clinton has always been a public official. Bill Clinton is remembered primarily as a political spouse. 

Students barely remember a car concept called Saturn.

Hate crimes legislation has always been a subject of debate, with Matthew Shepard and James Byrd Jr. as inspirational figures.

Students have never known a Winter Olympics without Curling. For that matter, they’ve never seen both Winter and Summer Olympics in the same year. 

There have always been tobacco settlement dollars as part of US state appropriations.

Quebec has always been declaring independence from Canada.

Judge Judy has always been reigning over afternoon court.

Madonna has always been a mom. For that matter, Eminem and Madonna have invitations to parents’ weekend for their honor roll daughters. 

These students have no native memory of 9/11.

Student Trends

The University of Michigan at Ann Arbor has participated in the entering undergraduate student study of the Cooperative Institutional Research Program (CIRP) each year since 1993. UM has over a decade of trend information about incoming students. By learning about the changes and similarities over this time, we can be better prepared to educate these students during their undergraduate years, and to ask questions of future students that may aid in their education and graduation.
During the past 23 years, 105,398 University of Michigan entering students have participated in this survey. This information provides a unique window to study trends that affect how we create meaningful learning experiences for undergraduate students. During 2015, 5,257 University of Michigan students responded to the survey yielding a 87.0% response rate. What you see on the following pages is descriptive of these University of Michigan students.