ACUHO-I News Blog

The student affairs and higher education Twitter community was buzzing on Wednesday with people sharing the link to the Pew Research Center’s “How Millennial Are You?” quiz.  The fourteen question quiz provides a generational result ranging from Millennial [1981+] to Silent [1928-1945]. While results of the quiz were being Tweeted throughout the day, conspicuously absent from the conversation was dialog about what the quiz was actually trying to accomplish.

It is obvious from the questions on the quiz that this is a glorified Internet meme. The results, truly, are meaningless. Many of the traits being assigned to Millennial or Generation X are as much a function of personality as they are generational. Or, more flawed, they are things out of the control of the participant [e.g. the quiz asks about parents’ marital status].

While the site doesn’t portend to be an accurate evaluation, the ensuing conversation was fascinating about how student affairs professional perceive Millennial students. In fact, some seemed insulted to be considered a Millennial, flaunting their Generation X result.

Has it become a status symbol to be identified as a member of one generation rather than another? When did Millennial become a four-letter word, even for those who work in student affairs and higher ed? And, more importantly, have we lost sight that generational identities are indicators of trends in thought patterns, behaviors, and motivation?

Check out the quiz yourself and share your thoughts below.

This week on Inside HigherEd, read about how colleges and universities are attempting, with mixed success,  to social-network for money; how fewer students are coming to the United States for higher eduation; and how students’ paid affects their lives.

THE SOCIAL MEDIA MAZE: Colleges are eager to leverage Facebook and Twitter to boost recruiting and fund raising, but many still don’t have a coherent strategy for how to do it.

WILL WORK FOR BEER: Economists find evidence that college students choose to take jobs not to pay tuition but to cover other expenses and, unless they work a lot, those jobs don’t do much to harm their academic performance.

INTERNATIONAL ‘LEAPFROGGING’: Study examines impact of decline in share of world’s college students who are educated in the United States.

COURSE HERO OR COURSE VILLAIN?: Professors worry that new companies might be making money from their copyrights while encouraging plagiarism among their students.

DARWIN, FROM THE CREATIONISTS: Anti-evolution group plans to distribute 100,000 copies of Origin of Species next month — with an introduction designed to undercut the book and promote a literal view of the Bible.

…of course, we’re all still talking about whether Facebook is dead, so perhaps it’s not. If you have strong feelings on the topic (or want to read the views of those who do) see this story on the Chronicle of Higher Education’s website. Since we’ve all heard that Twitter isn’t of interest to the young folks, what’s coming up next? Telegrams? Letter-writing? Calling cards? Do you have any ideas?

Last week, with the 2009 ACUHO-I Annual Conference & Exposition, ACUHO-I completed its first “major” use of Twitter — the latest social-media craze. Before the conference was over we had more than 225 “followers,” many of whom shared their thoughts about speakers, sessions, travel, social plans, meeting colleagues, and more. For those following the Twitter-feed, it was like getting to eavesdrop on dozens of great conversations all at once.

In the future, ACUHO-I will continue to use Twitter to promote news, developments, new resources, and other information of importance to those in the college housing profession. In other words, we will use it like many of your campuses already are: alerting students to deadlines, news, and information.

Right now, we’d like to hear what you think about the use of Twitter at the conference. Was it useful? Did you participate? How could we improve it? Did you use it to follow the conference, even if you weren’t able to attend in person?

Post your thoughts in the comment section below. You can also e-mail them to James Baumann, the ACUHO-I director of communications and marketing. Or you can just Twitter about it — just be sure to use the #acuhoi hashtag so we can easily find your comments.

And for any of you still unsure of the Twitter phenomena, click the red box here and check out the video.