Faculty Workshopwith Cara Meixner, Ph.D.January 16 & 17, 2014

Learn the characteristics of the Millennial Generation that distinguish them from other generations of college students.

Identify strategies that assist in successfully engaging these students, in the classroom.

Reflect on how knowledge about this generation can influence our work.

The Gaussian Distribution Most research sensitizes us to what’s happening around

the mean of a normal distribution. What about the outliers?

False Precision (Pew Trust) Level of arbitrariness in setting chronological bounds

Stereotype threat (Steele & Aronson) The risk of confirming, as self-characteristic, a

stereotype about one’s group.

Using the materials in front of you, please answer the questions below. Feel free to list, scribe, draw, or mind map your answers!

What characteristics do you believe apply to most of JMU’s traditionally aged undergraduate students?In what cases or scenarios are these characteristics misapplied or inappropriately stereotyped?

You have 10 minutes to complete this activity!

How others seeHow others seethis this

generation…generation…(for better and for worse)(for better and for worse)

Photos from Millennials Rising, Strauss & Howe

MOST LEAST

Techno-connected and dependent

Majority female Entitled Lack interpersonal skills Everyone gets a trophy Service minded Residential Compartmentalization

(work-play) Culturally aware

Not (all) tech-savvy Not all party Not all extraverts Don’t all want to be

spoon fed Disconnectedness in the

connectedness Not all wealthy Not all focused on grades Overcoming barriers to

be here Some work 8 to 5 Not all from NOVA and NJ

Confident Self-expressive Liberal Upbeat Open to change

TraditionalistsTraditionalists Baby BoomersBaby Boomers Gen XersGen Xers MillennialsMillennials

Born 1900-1945 Born 1946-1964 Born 1965-1980 Born 1981-1999

LoyalLoyal OptimisticOptimistic SkepticalSkeptical RealisticRealistic

Build a career legacy

Build a stellar career

Build a portable career

Build parallel careers

1. Weathered WWII

2. Smart3. Honest

1. Work ethic2. Respectful3. Values and

morals

1. Tech use2. Work ethic3. Traditional

values

1. Tech use2. Pop culture3. Tolerance

From When Generations Collide by Lynne C. Lancaster and David Stillman; and Pew Research Center

Generation differences are due to 1) life cycle effects, 2) period effects like recession, war, 3) cohort effects like trends within young adults (Pew Research Center, 2010)

The series of statements comes from the work of the Pew Research Center, which sampled a representative

cadre of 2,020 adults within the Millennial cohort. Data were also drawn from other Pew surveys on

changing attitudes toward work, gender differences, technology, and political ideology.

M = E * V – CMotivation is a product of what students expect and what they value, minus the

cost.

Flow Theory, by Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi

How can these and other data influence or inform our work with learners in the classroom?

What is one concrete strategy you might enlist to engage millennial learners in a new way?

Excerpt from High-Impact Educational Practices: What They Are, Who Has Access to Them, and Why They Matter, by George D. Kuh (AAC&U, 2008)

meixnecx@jmu.edu

Enrollment (Fall 2011*)

Undergraduate: 17,900Graduate: 1,822Full-Time: 18,166Part-Time: 1,556In-State: 72.9%Out-of-State: 27.1%

Total enrollment: 19,722 (20,032 for 2012)

Average SAT = 1,147

Please see this Factsheet for more information.Check out diversity trends here.

Gender40% male, 60% female