MIT Faculty NewsletterVol. XIV No. 1

New Kids on the Block:Observations on the Newest Generation of MIT Students
Marilee JonesO

ne of the great pleasures ofworking in Admissions is that
I’m afforded a bird’s eye viewof American teenage culture. While thefreshman application has changed little
over time and 17-year-olds are always
the same in some fundamental ways, theattitudes, values, and activities of ourapplicants do change quite dramaticallyeach decade or so, heralding the arrivalof a new generation. This shift has
occurred again and the leading edge ofthis newest generation now fills all four
undergraduate classes at MIT. Thesestudents are as different from us as wewere from our parents’ generation. Theircharacteristics bode well for society as awhole, but not necessarily for MIT as it
is today. Their presence will provoke areevaluation of our purpose and mission
and they will challenge all of us adults tolead them in ways we are not expecting.
They will change MIT as surely as MIT
will change them. And I’m not sure
we’re ready for them.
The GenerationsFirst, by way of background, let’s
consider the different generations
represented at MIT today. A quickcomparisonofgenerational
characteristics captures the obvious
differences among them. I refer here toRocking the Ages: The Yankelovich
Report on Generational Marketing,Walker Smith and Anne Chirman, ’97,
which describes four twentieth-century
generations: Matures, Baby Boomers,
Generation X and Millennials. (N.B.:
These generalizations are meant tocapture the overall characteristics of thegiven population, not necessarily all
individuals within it.)
The first group, labeled Matures,
includes the World War II generation as
well as the following Silent Generation.

Matures, made up of 61.8 million
members born between 1909 and 1945,
were affected most by the key markersof the Great Depression, the New Deal,World War II, the GI Bill. As a result, thekey characteristics of this group are teamwork, commitment, sacrifice, discipline,
financial and social conservatism. (Theyare also known to the following
generation as “The Establishment.”)
Most of the senior administration at MIT
is made up of Matures.
Baby Boomers, born between 1946and 1964, are the largest single
generation in US history at 77 million
members. They were affected by
Vietnam, TV, Woodstock, Watergate,and, of course, sex, drugs, and rock androll. Boomers are characterized byidealism, individualism, selfimprovement, high expectations and anintense self-centeredness. Most current
faculty members are Boomers, as well
as a little over half of all student services
administrators, including the Dean ofAdmissions.
Generation X, born between 1965 and1978, is the smallest population of thefour at 52.4 million members. They wereat the epicenter of the cultural meltdown
brought about by the Baby Boomers intheir effort to separate from the Matures.
As a result, members of this cohort arecharacterized by pragmatism, diversity,entrepreneurial spirit, desire for a highquality of life, savvyness. They weremost affected by AIDS, MTV, PCs,
divorce, the Internet. This resourcefuland resilient generation created the dot
com phenomenon. Nearly half of student
services administrators are Gen Xers.
Millennials, the newest generation,
are the subject of this article. Born after
1979, they will nearly eclipse the Baby
Boomers in size at just under 77 million- 12 -

members (and growing). The
Yankelovich Report describes theirmarkers as OJ, Monica Lewinsky andmulti-culturalism. I would add theColumbine shootings to that list. Key
characteristics of this group areneotraditionalism, ritual, optimism,technological adeptness, volunteerism,
busyness.
We can see the presence and the impactof these different generations at MIT
over time in Table #1. As you know, allvarsity teams and activities at MIT havebeen started by students. The 60%
increase in varsity team offerings
between 1970 and 1990 was the direct
result of Title 9 which mandated gender
equity in athletic offerings in publicschools. The doubling of MIT clubs
between 1980 and 1990 came about as aresult of Gen X students who, used tofinding community through commoninterests, created a plethora of ECAs
(extra curricular activities), quite adifferent model of community building
from their Boomer predecessors whoconnected through larger socialmovements. The doubling again of clubs
and activities between 1990 and 2000
indicates the recent presence of theMillennials. Though there is no way toactually know, I would posit that thenumber of ECAs carried per MIT student
now is higher than in years past.
Millennials, as we shall see, areextremely busy people.
While I agree with the Yankelovichsummary of Millennials, I’d like to sharemy own observations of this new
generation as seen through the MIT
application process, through thechanging trends in the essays, activities,
letters of recommendations, interview
reports. I preface this with the clear(Continued on next page)

MIT Faculty Newsletter

September 2001

New Kids on the Block:Observations on MIT Students
Jones, from preceding page• They are attracted to large social
movements, very much like their
Boomer parents, but look for ways toVarsity Teams and Clubs
make their contributions on a local level,
Entrance
Varsity
Clubs/ more like the Gen Xers. They areYearTeams
Activities expected (even required) to volunteer intheir communities, working side by side'60
2160
with adults who teach them competence
and effectiveness. Consequently, they'70
2371
know how to work the system and they'80
3180
always have a Plan B. Many of our'90
37150
students have already made significant'00
41356
contributions to their communities whilestill in high school.
understanding that I am discussing MIT• They are not as likely to study
applicants from the US (a specialized subjects for the pure pleasure of it, notgroup to be sure). I am also generalizing as likely to focus on one thing, because
like crazy, since we are now seeing just they are the busiest students in US
the leading edge of this amazing group, history. The majority of my audiences
the peak number of which has just entered this age seem to carry upwards frommiddle school.
eight ECAs in high school, in addition to• They are idealistically pragmatic. a stiff course load. (I wonder when these
Combining the idealism of their Boomer teens actually sleep.) They haveparents and the pragmatism of the Gen essentially been trained to be generalists.
Xers, these students really want to make Consider the tension created when MIT
the world a better place and, most Mature, Boomer and Gen X faculty, whoimportantly, they have a plan.
are living their passion, teach Millennials,• They are group centered. As the who want to learn the material just well
population with the highest percentage enough to get a good grade so they canof members in day care from an early move on to the other 17 activities theyage, they have learned good group skills, have to master that day. This has thehow to lead and follow as circumstances makings of a classic generation gap.
demand. They spend more time in groups• They desire instant gratification.
and group activities than their A member of the Financial Services
predecessors.
staff remarked recently that these kids
• They have no problem with “have never heard a busy signal.” They
authority. These students have been raised are used to surfing the Web and theyin relative affluence in peacetime by prefer Instant Messaging to the phone
Boomer parents. Most of their free time is for the sake of efficiency. (Why have aspent in adult-supervised activities. They conversation with just one friend when
have little urge to push back against adults. you can speak with 8 simultaneously?)
In fact, they actually like adults. This is With Boomer parents who demand top
shocking to both Boomers and Gen Xers service and strive to meet their childrens’
who still regard authority figures with every need, these kids expect what theysuspicion, but Matures find a certain want when they want it from all of theresonance with them.
adults in their lives.

Table 1

- 13 -• They may not see or accept theconsequences of their behavior. Adults
are always saving these kids. I see that
top high school students who fail exams
or miss deadlines due to outsidecommitments are regularly protected bytheir teachers and school personnel.
Excuses are made, adults blame
themselves rather than allow the student
to accept the painful consequences that
previous generations knew all too well.
Parents do most of the negotiating withadmissions offices now, regularly
weighing in on every piece of the process
on behalf of their busy children, taking
on an almost eerie quality of parent-asapplicant. No surprise that students cheat
more often, drop activities if they can’twin, cut corners. Their time is all carvedup, given away to multiple andcompeting demands that please adults
while the adults in their lives race toprotect them from failure.
Is MIT a good matchfor this generation?
In many ways, we are a good matchfor them. These kids are hard workers,
carrying up to a third more courses inhigh school than we did at their age, so
the MIT workload isn’t as big an issue tothem. They can balance competing
demands. MIT is the firehose. They are
diverse and require diversity. You can’t
find a more diverse private university in
the US than MIT. They can lead orfollow as required, and there are plentyof opportunities to do both here. They
desire relevant work. We’re all about
relevance, eschewing ivory tower. They
are intensely busy. Busy is our middle
name.
But in many more ways I worry about
the match. First, while these Millennials
are busy, they are “diverse” busy,spreading their energies over many(Continued on next page)

MIT Faculty NewsletterVol. XIV No. 1

New Kids on the Block:Observations on MIT Students
Jones, from preceding page

activities, not the “focused” busy of theclassic Techie, who eats, sleeps, anddreams their passion. They desire
structure when we are all about choice.
They don’t consider “choice” to be avalue as the Boomers and Gen Xers do.
These kids were raised on the World
Wide Web and 90 channels of cable.
They do not need 30+ choices of living
groups – they are busy…they just want aroom. You can see the evidence for thisattitude in Table #2 , the chart listing thetop reasons why admitted MIT applicantschose to enroll elsewhere. Last year, forthe first time, housing and the quality of
the campus, was the #3 reason why thestudents we worked so hard to admit
went to other schools. This year, thequality of student life, which includes
housing and campus issues, was #2 onthat list. This generation is voting with
its feet. The current housing system withits myriad choices and arcane rules, anartefact of the Boomer era, is no longer
relevant to the students of today. MIThousing is changing just in time.
Most disturbing to me, though, is that
the MIT Millennials, who have beenraised on praise and positive reenforcement, are in for real culture shock.
They have been groomed to highachievement, feted by their schools andcommunities, have starred in USA Today
as well as in their local papers, have beencheered in their games by adults fromboth sides. They have nearly all earned
at least state level distinction insomething. Think about that for a second.
What would it have taken to be thestate’s best something when you were
their age? It is a big deal and they could
not have gotten that far without positive
support from the adults in their lives. As
we all know, there is very little of this atMIT, for any of us. These students cometo MIT, ready for us to lead them andTable 2
Why Admitted Freshmen Choose Not to Enroll
1960

1970

1980

1990

2000Academic
concerns(lib arts)

Financial
Aid

Academicconcerns

Costs/
Academic
concerns

Costs

Academic
concerns(lib arts)

Location

Finances

Costs

Costs/
Academic
concerns

Academic
concerns
Housing/

Location
Diversity

position them for the next logicalprogression of their lives and theyquickly disengage from us because we
do not recognize their specialness. These
are not Boomers or Gen Xers who reacted
to this phenomenon by angrily pushing
MIT faculty and administrators awayand creating their own islands of support.
These students wonder why we glorify
the Big Screw Award, why the only
campus-wide community sentiment isIHTFP, why we tolerate the Tech Is Helllifestyle. They wonder why they turned
down Stanford to come here.
Why should we care or try to change?
It is no surprise that I am writing thisas Dean of Admissions. Many faculty
who have worked with the Admissions
staff and with CUAFA know well that
we are in a tough period in college
admissions. Our competition (Harvard,Stanford, Princeton, Yale) is actively
recruiting our kind of students – Techies– at a time when these students’ portfoliosare now so balanced they are just as
attractive to liberal arts schools as they
are to us. And everywhere universities
are buying top talent. In short, we now- 14 -

have to work aggressively just tocontinue to hold our base. To makethings worse, Millennials require a senseof the larger community that can readily
be found at our competitor schools. MIT,with its focus on the individual, without
a sense of campus-wide community,
looks pale in comparison, like an outlier,to these kids. MIT will need to adapt insome ways if we are to continue to enroll
the best students of our type in the world.
What they need from us
Millennials need MIT. Despite their
good qualities, and there are many, thesestunning young people need to learn tothink analytically and to question more.
They need a sense of context to help
them sort through the dizzying mass of
information they confuse for knowledge.
And closer to this Boomer’s heart, theyneed to realize that actions haveconsequences, so that in the future they
will be less likely to hand over theirprivacy – and ours – for the sake ofefficient consumer service. (They don’t
call these kids “the Abercrombiegeneration” for nothing.)(Continued on next page)

MIT Faculty Newsletter

September 2001

New Kids on the Block:Observations on MIT Students
Jones, from preceding page

Whether we acknowledge it or not, we
adults at MIT do act “in loco parentis,”playing a major role in the lives of ourstudents. Just as we expect them to meet
our needs regarding deadlines, classparticipation, attention to detail, etc.,
they need specific things from us inorder to thrive here.
• They need to understand the rules.
For example, we can’t assume that theyactually know what is consideredcheating these days. It is possible thatthey do not realize that pulling something
off of the Web and not citing the source
is a bad thing. I understand that cheatingcases of this sort have escalated in thepast three years at MIT, so I encourage
you to clearly define your rules at thebeginning of each semester, describe
the repercussions of violating your rules
and then follow through if violation
happens. Remember that most adults intheir lives cave in to them easily, so they
will push back hard. Stand firm throughall of their excuses and whining.
Eventually they will realize that you
mean business and they’ll comply
because Millennials generally want toobey the rules.
• They need to hear about MIT’s
history and relevance in the world
and to be reminded why they are here.
This is a big one. These students knowthat they are special and they have asense that MIT is, too. Yet, once they
arrive on campus, they never again hear
about why MIT is so famous. I believethat this is one of the reasons whygenerations of bright-eyed MIT students,
the best in the world, have become
disconnected, often cynical, by the endof their freshman year. It is not theworkload alone, but a total lack ofinspiration. This past spring I spoke at aleadership seminar on campus. One ofthe students told me, in passing, that hehad not been doing well
Table 3in an advanced course
taken by many freshmen
MIT Faculty By Generation Typeuntil the professor spentan entire class on theBoomers
Generation XMatures
many ways that MIT (1909-1944)(1945-1964)(1964-1979)
specifically advanced
285502164that particular field,describing the history, thepeople, the same labs operational on analytically for a living, it is often hard
campus today. The student was energized to keep that skill, designed for the world
when he realized that he was part of that of ideas, from spilling into our sociallegacy. He saw the relevance of the discourse. We can inadvertently becomematerial. He concluded the semester with critical of ourselves and of others. Thesean “A” and the confirmed desire to students serve to remind us that we adults
become a scientist. There is a great lesson hold a special responsibility to encourage
here for everyone who teaches at this these future leaders of the world withremarkable place. Our competition tells words of kindness as we teach them theits students that one day they will inherit ropes.
• They need to be allies with us.
the world as it is. We need to tell ourstudents that one day they will fix the MIT undergraduates have long existed
world on behalf of the others who can’t. in what I call a Lord of the Flies WorldThis is not only the truth. It is the clarion in which, without adult intervention andcall to this generation, the mother ship engagement, they create their own rules
calling the baby ships home. I believe and live with more danger than we mightthat if we remind our students on a imagine. These new students will
regular basis that we fix this world, we increasingly find this to be unacceptable
do what others think is impossible, we because they are used to alliance with“apply science for the benefit of adults. Many of us will need to be morehumankind” as MIT was founded to do, open to such alliance opportunities as
and they are part of that effort, IHTFP Millennials enroll in force over the next
will dissolve within five years. And the decade.
From my point of view, the future
best of our kind of student will continue
to come to MIT for another generation. looks bright. If we assume our natural• They need to be involved in role as the wise elders of this community
decision making, but they need for during their tenure at MIT, and if weus to make the final decisions. We apprentice them well, the world will beBoomers in particular have a tendency in good hands with these Millennials.
toward consensus even when Not only will this huge population ofconsensus is inappropriate. They don’t very hard workers who care aboutwant us to be friends. They want us to community do good things in their lives,
they will never let Social Security fail.
lead.
• They need praise and positive And that should help us all sleep a lot
feedback. At MIT, we put too much better tonight.✥
stock in perspiration and not enough in [Marilee Jones can be reached atinspiration. Because we think marilee@mit.edu]- 15 -