Adapting to today’s students

Adapting what they learn
Generation Z, a.k.a. today’s high school students, are seeking financial security—and many of them are already thinking about how their educations will shape their career paths. One step colleges are taking is expanding their curricula.

Deciding on the programs in which to invest poses challenges: colleges don’t want to invest in a program on social media just to find out later it’s a fad. New college majors are trending toward more specific and career-oriented subjects, like Saint Xavier University’s new hospitality management degree, or East Central University’s new program on water policy.

If Generation Z is anything like Millennials, many of them will be interested in entrepreneurship. The University of California and Cornell College are just a couple of colleges focusing more closely on business and management options, with Cornell adding a new management track to its one-and-a-half-year old business program.

Fine arts programs are focusing more on job-preparation as well. The School of Art, Art History & Design at the University of Nebraska-Lincoln will be adding a graphic design major in the fall of 2017, and Cornell College theatre is offering a revitalized dance program to provide a more robust education for students interested in performance.

Adapting the learning experience
Institutions recognize the responsibility to provide high-quality educations that are worth the time and financial investment required. A big question in Higher Education has been whether or not the liberal arts can live up to that worth.

In her speech at the annual meeting of The National Association for College Admission Counseling this fall, Patricia McGuire, President of Trinity Washington University, discussed how Higher Education needs to adapt in “Confronting Myths, Exploring Realities: American Higher Education in 2016.” McGuire said this about concerns regarding the value of liberal arts:

Quite often, when we unpack the criticism of college curricula, we find that the issue is not really a fundamental problem with the liberal arts, at all, but rather, serious concern about a delivery system that remains deeply rooted in 19th century notions of academic disciplines and departments, seat time in traditional classrooms, and the accumulation of credits without any real validation of the actual outcomes.

Aligned with these concerns, the Associated Colleges of the Midwest (ACM), a conglomeration of 14 liberal arts colleges, connect and collaborate to best prepare students for life in a rapidly changing world. Member colleges seek to offer rounded educations that provide opportunities for students to master communication, critical thinking, problem solving, intercultural literacy, and other transferable skills that will prepare them to excel in any career.

Cornell and Colorado Colleges offer a particularly flexible Block Plan, where students take one course at a time. The block plan allows faculty to frequently take courses outside of the classroom to learn in the field. Biologists collect specimen from prairie grasslands, and art history students travel to museums to see works they are studying in person.

McGuire also spoke to the need of colleges to adapt to a more diverse American college student population. Embracing a more diverse college campus as part of an educational mission requires more than admitting more diverse students. Institutions must transform campus culture and the education offered. Many colleges, like Cornell College, are taking steps to be more inclusive by providing diversity training to all faculty and staff and by working on hiring more people of color in positions of authority. McGuire cited Trinity as an institution that has undergone significant paradigm shifts to focus on bringing in more students of color.