Publications and Research
Document Type
Article
Publication Date
8-28-2017
Abstract
The 19th century American theologian and
author James Freeman Clarke is credited with
coining the phrase, “A politician thinks of the
next election. A statesman, of the next generation.”
Although higher education in this country
is currently embattled on many fronts, that should
not distract us from looking years ahead to figure
out how we can prepare for new generations of
students.
One of those upcoming generations has been
labeled “Generation Alpha,” a term crafted by
Mark McCrindle, an Australian social researcher,
demographer and futurist. Unlike “Generation Z,”
born in the mid 1990s and who are today’s college
students, generation alpha consists of those born
after 2010 – and 2.5 million of them are born every
week around the world. They may be toddlers and
infants today, but this generation will be quite
different from the traditional college students we
are used to seeing.
Comments
This work was originally published in The Edwardsville Intelligencer.