Various University staff members and students joined President Paul Hennigan Monday in discussions and debate regarding today’s younger generations.
The event, Civic Responsibility: What’s your Role? gathered members of the United Student Government (USG) and other students and staff to take part in group conversations based on five questions that were handed out prior to the event. Initiated by Hennigan, each group, coordinated by tables, was given 10 minutes to discuss their designated question. The groups were then brought back together to debate these questions with everyone in attendance.
One group of students focused on a question with regard to the Millennial and the Digital Generations and how they can be “self-absorbed” or “me”-oriented. USG Treasurer Thaddeus Covaleski summed up his group’s thoughts on the subject.
“There is constant competition in today’s world to make it to the top and to be successful,” Covaleski said. “When it comes to taking action with civil responsibility, it is, in a sense, forced upon individuals. Here, you are forced into a corner to make a decision on what angle you want or need to take on an issue, and we think that is where these generations begin to become me-oriented.”
Contributing to what Covaleski said, Dean of Student Life Michael Gieseke added that this label should not necessarily be looked at as a negative.
“I think it’s through what you all have been told. You have put values to what you have been talking about, and I don’t know that you always need to,” Gieseke said. “You are talking about how you are a digital generation and how that is a bad thing, but you don’t understand that it isn’t. It means that you interact with the world differently, and I think older generations have looked down on you for that, and that’s why you think that way.”
The remaining questions focused on civic responsibility, voting and social media in today’s society.
As the facilitator of the event, Hennigan was a large part of the discussion, weighing in on students’ opinions. Some of the debates and ideas that students presented Monday helped to give him a better understanding of improvements that could be made at the University.
“That is very interesting that you think that the University should provide more opportunities for students to talk about current events in the classroom. That is a huge curricular issue that we should pass on to [Senior Vice President of Academic and Student Affairs, Karen McIntyre],” Hennigan said when responding to a group’s ideas.
Dean of Students and Associate Vice President of Student Affairs, Keith Paylo, also directed the conversation toward issues on campus. He spoke in respect to issues about comments on social media last week.
He and other staff members received inappropriate comments that spoke about the school’s decision to not cancel classes due to the inclement weather. With the use of Facebook and Twitter, many students criticized the University, using vulgar words or profanity, and Paylo said this generation could have approached the matter differently.
“The way social media was used in this case, I don’t know how people expect us to take them seriously with the comments that they use. I responded to every message I received in a respectable way and took it seriously,” Paylo said. “We are up at 3 and 4 in the morning in these instances checking the radar, temperatures and seeing what other schools are doing. Your safety is first and foremost, but by the messages that we were receiving, that is not the reaction we should get off of social media.”
