Dr. Spencer Overton (George Washington University Law School) is currently researching generational differences and poses the question, Are Baby Boomer Profs Better than Gen X Profs?
He quotes NAS Recruitment Communications as reporting:
“Generation Y is expected to get along better with the Baby Boomers than those belonging to Generation X. . . . Generation X thinks that the Yers do not want to perform menial tasks and entry-level positions. The feeling of ‘I had to work to get there, why don't they?’ is one of the major obstacles between members of Generation X and Y.”
As he notes, "Conventional wisdom has it that students (Gen Y) relate more easily to younger professors (Gen X)—but the statement above seems to suggest that older Baby Boomer professors may have an edge."
What is your opinion on this? Do Baby Boomer profs relate better to this current crop of Gen Y students? Should we adapt our teaching styles to the generations that we find in our classrooms?
A colleague once told me about a study (which I've never been able to locate, so it may be apocryphal) that graphed student evaluation scores against faculty age.
According to my colleague, the result was an inverted bell curve: students responded well to faculty near their own ages and to faculty near their grandparents' ages, but not to faculty in between, near their parents' ages.
Posted by: Kenneth W. Davis | January 25, 2007 at 09:23 PM
I've heard of this too but not sure if it is true or an urban legend. Also, with this new generation with helicopter parents, perhaps it is less true? Would make an interesting study.
Posted by: Delaney Kirk | January 27, 2007 at 02:56 PM