Millennials Style! How Today’s Students Are Shaping Higher Education

    If you search the word “millennial” online, you find a lot of opinions. The loudest view, though, is probably that millennials are ruining some industries and principles. On the other side of the spectrum, you will find some people arguing against this. Typically, this argument turns into a younger vs older generation.

    Whichever side of the argument you are on, you have to admit one thing – millennials are leaving a mark on the world just like every other generation before them, whether that change is good or bad is up for debate. One area that we see changes it is in higher education, and the marks millennials leave are likely to be felt by future generations as well.

    Technology Brings Convenience

    Probably the most apparent change in higher education by millennials is how they use technology to change the landscape of learning.

    There are a few ways that this has come about. First, it has made researching and finding information much more comfortable. Whereas the older generation and the generations before them were bound to scour books for information, resources like Wikipedia and more reliable online databases offer immediate answers to any question they may have. Even for long-form essays, most students find everything they need in a Google search instead of searching library shelves.

    There is also the convenience of online resources such as an essay writing service. With these services, students can pay to have an assignment done for them. Rather than being used for laziness, though, these resources and their use are often employed to combat the heavy workload that higher education students bear.

    This does prompt universities to be careful, fair, and strict with their honour code. While online resources help them to check for plagiarism easier, services like essay writing services fall into a place that hasn’t needed to be categorised before. With these new developments, higher education institutions will be led to rethink and rewrite what’s permissible and what they disapprove of and just like the rules already in motion, and these new rules will affect higher education for years to come.

    School Is Lasting Longer

    Many millennials are making the push to get higher degrees that generations past. This has more to do with the current job market than anything else.

    Whereas someone with a bachelor’s degree or even an associate’s degree could easily find a job in the past, the job market has become much more competitive when it comes to comparing education levels.

    As such, compared to past generations, many more millennials are pursuing graduate studies after they complete their initial first few years of college. With higher degrees, millennials are opening up new opportunities and earning more.

    Collaboration Is Making Learning Easier

    When most of us think of a higher education class, we think of a professor lecturing a room full of students who are busily taking notes. Even adjusted for the modern era, this picture still usually comes to mind in the form of a lecturer presenting a PowerPoint while students type away on laptops.

    However, many lessons are turning into collaborative projects. This means more group projects, for one. Besides, though, it also says that professors and students can work together on projects as well.

    A big part of this development can, like other points we’ve looked at in this article, be attributed to technology. With file sharing and online technologies such as DropBox, Word Online, and Google Drive, it is much easier for a group of people to work on a project together even if they can’t find the time for all of them to meet up.

    Conclusion

    Millennials are changing a lot, whether you love them or hate them. Just one area they are changing is higher education.

    From the technology they use in the ways that they learn, millennials mark on education is significant. The changes that this generation brings won’t stop when they graduate either. These changes will affect future generations as well.

    It is also inevitable that the same way millennials are changing and building upon the educational ideals of the past, future generations will make on the ideas and concepts brought to the table by millennials.

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