Beloit College's Mindset List: What Students Know and Don't Know

Every year at this time, Beloit College in Wisconsin, publishes a list of characteristics of the incoming freshmen class. The list is meant to help adults of whatever age relate to the youth of today. Cultural and social references that we may take for granted (e.g., Gilligan’s Island, the Fonz) are completely lost on today’s 18 year-olds. So this list is a good corrections for us old fogeys who are trying to be hip (um, do kids even use that word?).
Some highlights that I particularly like:

  • Lenin’s name has never been on a major city in Russia.
  • They never heard an attendant ask “Want me to check under the hood?”
  • There have always been charter schools.
  • IBM has never made typewriters.

Time marches on, folks, and sometimes we have to run to catch up.
Mark Montgomery
Counselor to Youth (and running to catch up)