Most freshman entering Beloit College this fall were born in 1981 -- the year President Reagan took office. To help professors understand members of the Class of 2003, the college has for the second year released a “Mindset List.” A sampling:
- They are the first generation to be born into Luvs, Huggies, and Pampers.
- John Lennon and John Belushi have always been dead.
- There has always been a woman on the Supreme Court, and women have always been traveling into space.
- They have never needed a prescription to buy ibuprofen.
- They were born and grew up with Microsoft, IBM PCs, in-line skates, NutraSweet, fax machines, film on disks, and unregulated quantities of commercial interruptions on television.
- Somebody named Dole has always been running for something.
- Cats has been on Broadway all of their lives.
- They never heard anyone say, “Book ‘em, Danno,” “Good night, John-boy,” or “Kiss my grits” in prime time.
- They never knew Madonna when she was like a virgin.
- Mike Myers is The Spy Who Shagged Me, not the first Congressman expelled in a century for his role in “Abscam.”
- They have never had to worry about the packaging of Tylenol.
- Jesse Jackson has always been getting someone out of trouble someplace.
- Strikes by highly paid athletes have been a routine part of professional athletics.
- The moonwalk is a Michael Jackson dance step, not a Neil Armstrong giant step.
- Space travel has always been accomplished in reusable spacecraft.
- The term “adult” has increasingly come to mean “dirty.”
- In the year they were born, reports condemned violence on television and in Hollywood films for producing the likes of John Hinckley.
- They have always been able to get their news from USA Today and CNN.
- They have spent more than half of their lives with Bart Simpson.
- They don’t understand why Solidarity is spelled with a capital “S.”
- They don’t think there is anything terribly futuristic about 2001, and were never concerned about 1984.
- They have probably never dialed a phone or opened an icebox.
- They have never seen white smoke over the Vatican and do not know its significance.
- Ketchup has always been a vegetable.
- They remember when Saturday Night Live was still funny.
They Can Lock Her Out, but They Can’t Shut Her Up
The feminist theologian Mary Daly doesn’t need to worry about the door hitting her on her way out of Boston College. It’s been locked behind her.
Ms. Daly, an associate professor of theology, has been fighting to hold onto her job -- and her office -- since last winter, when her refusal to allow men into her classes threatened to embroil B.C. in an ugly bias suit. When the college ordered Ms. Daly to open her classes to men, she replied that she would rather retire.
That sounded good to B.C. The college drew up a retirement agreement, but Ms. Daly refused to sign it. A court rejected her request for an injunction, finding her oral commitment to retire binding. She is now suing for breach of contract.
Meanwhile, Ms. Daly is trying her case in the court of public opinion. She held a press conference at her office on August 10, the deadline the college had given her to vacate the premises so that it could get the office ready for a new hire. With reporters looking on, Ms. Daly tried to unlock the door, but it wouldn’t budge. The key had worked the night before.
Ms. Daly’s conclusion: She had been evicted. The college’s explanation: Either Ms. Daly had used the wrong key or the lock had jammed when the office was being repainted. A custodian sprayed oil on the lock, while Ms. Daly was holding her press conference, and the door opened.
“She feigned the lockout to draw attention,” says Jack Dunn, a B.C. spokesman. “It was a childish, contrived act.”
“That’s bull!” Ms. Daly thunders. “They changed the lock.” The custodian was using a different key, she says. “They’ve taken my classroom, my office, and my voice.”
After repeatedly asking Ms. Daly to clear out her belongings, college officials put Ms. Daly’s things in storage and very publicly changed the lock.
Celebrating the Ups and Downs of the Century
At the turn of the century, when carousels were at their peak of popularity, about 10,000 existed in the United States. By 1980, about 300 remained, most in disrepair. Students at New York’s School of Visual Arts have brought one such carousel back to life. Gone are the horses. Students have replaced them with swirling sculptures depicting events of the 20th century. Albert Einstein spins with the theory of relativity above his head, Elvis Presley swings his hips, and Andy Warhol rises out of a Campbell’s soup can.
Richard Awad, a school alumnus, created a sculpture of the Enola Gay dropping the first atomic bomb. “Mine was one of the more serious figures. I guess that is where our generation is at in its thinking of history -- most students did pop icons.”
Perhaps a ride on a Swanson’s TV dinner was just a little more amusing.
A Beer-Swilling Frat, and Proud of It
Finally, a fraternity that is up-front about its agenda: Beta Drinka Lotta touts its founding principles as boozing and binging, instead of bonding and brotherhood.
The fraternity was established at the University of Wisconsin at Platteville in 1995, although most campus officials didn’t learn of the group’s existence until this summer. They found out more than they wanted to know via the group’s World-Wide Web site (http://marina.fortunecity.com/coconut/5/bdl.html).
Frustrated when they were turned away from fraternity keg parties, the Platteville students formed the unofficial fraternity as freshmen. The Web site offers a forum for boasting about the joys of alcohol consumption and provides links to two other chapters, at the University of Wisconsin at Milwaukee and at Texas Christian University.
In one episode described on the Web site, the Platteville members said they had drunk 100 cases of beer during their freshman year and saved the boxes as trophies. That feat’s not exactly in line with the message that campus officials have been sending about alcohol consumption. But administrators do not seem overly concerned.
Richard Egley, assistant to the assistant chancellor for student affairs at Platteville, notes with some relief that of the 27 members listed on the Web site, only two are expected to live on the campus this fall. As for the Web site, Mr. Egley dismissed it as “nothing more than an electronic version of someone’s scrap book.”
At Milwaukee, officials said that Beta Drinka Lotta might be a ghost organization. “As far as we know, the group has never even been here,” says Tom McGinnity, director of student-organization advising. “I think we’re dealing with three or four students who are jumping from school to school.”
Officials on both Wisconsin campuses say they can do little about the Web sites because they are located on private servers. Texas Christian officials did do something. They contacted the student who had constructed the T.C.U. chapter’s site and asked him to pull it off line. He has complied.
Will new “pledges” be initiated this fall? Telephone calls to several of the students listed on the Platteville Web site were not returned.
Era of Ferment at Fresno State
Some students are versed in the art of guzzling wine. Students at California State University at Fresno are skilled in the art of making it.
Fresno State is the only university in the country licensed to produce, bottle, and sell wine commercially. Students in its fermentation-science program do all the work, supervised by professors.
This summer, the university’s 1998 Shiraz red won top honors -- a double-gold rating -- in the California State Fair Wine Competition. Fresno State’s five entries were pitted against more than 2,100 wines from 405 vineyards.
But the professional wineries didn’t seem upset, says Ken Fugelsang, the university’s winemaster. After all, they’re looking to hire Fresno’s students.
http://chronicle.com Section: Short Subjects Page: A12
