Great Expectation, Slight Contemplation – Results of a Survey of Student Attitudes on the Eve of the New Millennium

Abstract

In classrooms and courses, student attitudes are as important – probably, they are more important – than the students' intelligence and their preparation for college and university studies. Peter Sacks (a nom de plume), in his devastating book Generation X Goes to College, portrays contemporary student attitudes among his journalism students at a large suburban community college in the West. Much of his account of bored, unmotivated students who expect high grades will not be news to many geoscience teachers. Still, it is dismaying. Although there is much anecdotal material among geoscience teachers about student attitudes and their performance, little has been published. The results of this study support Sacks' story of dumbing down among students, dumbeddown to the dullest perception. Apparently, what worked for good teachers in the past will not succeed with the majority of today's students.