One More Year, and 'The Technology is [Still] the Easy Part!'

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Opinion

One More Year, and 'The Technology is [Still] the Easy Part!'

8/30/2007

By Terry Calhoun

One of the more challenging parts of working within a higher education institution, especially (but not only) in the information technology arena, is coping with what the students "bring with them" to campus. In the 1960s through the 1980s, probably the most troublesome "things" for administrators that students brought with them, excluding political beliefs and sexual behaviors, were their cars. We certainly haven't solved that one. (Wow, we don't have a very good history of coping with what the students bring with them, do we?)

For the last decade, what the students have brought with them that has most required the attention of the IT staff are their personal technology tools and their expectations about the IT functionality they'll have while on campus. Some of what older folks might consider "technology" that has to be provided for them, they just consider essential and expected parts of the environment. Going back to cars, for a moment, the annual Beloit College Mindset List notes about this year's incoming class, the"Class of 2011": "They have never "rolled down" a car window.

Other choice, related items from this year's list include:

13. "Off the hook" has never had anything to do with a telephone.

14. Music has always been "unplugged."

35. Stadiums, rock tours and sporting events have always had corporate names.

44. Thanks to MySpace and Facebook, autobiography can happen in real time.

66. The World Wide Web has been an online tool since they were born.

The folks making decisions about the school of public health at the University of Iowa might be interested in item 35, and some of might take issue with the World Wide Web having been an online tool since 1989 (as opposed to the Internet). Even so, they've certainly grown up using the Web, and the other items listed above also say reams ("What's a ream?") about these new campus inhabitants' inherent expectations.

I could easily go curmudgeonly on the "rolling up" windows item, as I try with each new car I purchase to not get that option and it's harder and harder to find. I still recall when my children were young a tragic car accident in Ann Arbor where some teenagers drove into a pond in a subdivision and could not get out of their car because the electric windows would not work once submerged. I've hated electric windows ever since. Maybe that's why my daily drive to work is currently a