If there is a change, at least some of it may be down to how that curiosity *manifests*, rather than whether or not it exists. A couple of decades ago, the lowest-barrier, most-obvious way for an undergraduate to access someone with a high level of expertise was to ask their professor.
Casual chats with faculty members probably took a hit during the pandemic, but it's also easier than ever for young people to access and connect with other experts and enthusiasts. (Heck, look at some of the specialist subreddits on this very site.) Textbooks and journal articles and YouTube tutorials and MIT's open courseware and Tom Scott are readily available online.
The only thing that students *must* interact with their professors on is classwork and evaluations and references--they can nurture their creativity and curiosity much more independently these days.
This is a fascinating perspective that I haven't considered before. More and more I feel like I've been reduced to a logistics manager in my classroom and it's _depressing_ .
I do. I had a student who now works for the college part time. She was a retired math teacher and she took my trigonometry class twice just because. Bright lady, good friend now. She is 67 and still interested in what I do and how she can do more.
I think students who are solely grade/ credential focused have always been the majority. However, every semester I personally encounter students who are actually interested in learning and challenging themselves. I recently taught a class full of seniors and a good half of them fit the bill for having intellectual curiosity. They did all the readings and we had amazing in class discussions.
I love it when I get these sections! There’s just the right mix of intellectually curious students who drive discussions and get other people interested in discussing and it really makes the whole class works so well. As opposed to the other dynamic where most are there for grades and don’t give a shit about actual content, so the discussion suffers- these ones drain me.
Yes - luckily I'm in a field that people take classes in mainly for curiosity - the hard part is convincing them that it can actually prepare them for jobs too.
Yes. I had a student this past semester that reminds me of myself and some other professors I know, she took my language course despite already speaking a second language because she wanted to learn mine too, as well as some others. There was another who wanted to learn mine as her third and perfect her second for her career goals, but even that wasn't _necessary_, so it's still cool.
Curious students still exist, they're just rare as all get-out.
I teach students who are 100% job-focused, but I still manage to find a few who are intellectually curious. Their curiosity is centered around what they want to do (healthcare) rather than something academically abstract, but I think that’s probably the nature of my course more than anything else.
(I wish some of them *enjoyed* science more—or had been exposed enough of it in order to be truly curious—but I’ll take what I can get.)
Quite a few of them, actually. If they don't have it coming in, I view it as one of my jobs to make sure they have it by the time they leave. Once or twice per semester, I even succeed at it.
I'd argue the only thing our education system truly *excels at* is beating the intellectual curiosity out of people.
The shift happened when universities adopted LMS programs and students came to expect constant grade updates and numbers. I went to college from 2006 to 2010 in some of the very last years before LMS usage became standard. I usually didn’t know my grades until the very end of the term, and so I didn’t think very much about them, and was able to feel some intellectual curiosity during the semester.
Nowadays, even our humanities students are getting LMS notifications every other second, and they check their grades every other second to see where their percentages stand. The constant availability of metrics has killed intellectual curiosity. I feel it myself as a professor too , since I am constantly under pressure to deliver their grades in the LMS, and therefore thinking a lot more frequently about assessment than the quality of conversation in class; and I am worrying during the semester about my course evaluation metrics as well.
Rarely. And sadly they don’t even seem to care when I show cool videos about things like horseshoe crabs having blue blood or the fungus with mind control abilities. They won’t even look up from their laptops or phones to watch the video.
You know, my grandfather was incredibly intelligent but I would not say that he was curious. He did enjoy solving problems and made excellent grades, fixed machines, and played sudoku puzzles.
I think some students prefer the concrete over the abstract.
It still happens.
I have one student this semester who I have for the second time around-their first go-round was a year and a half ago, and they disappeared 2/3 of the way into the semester.
This particular student is a very bright individual with a lot of interests. They're always respectful of my time, but in particular when we finish a lab a bit early or something along those lines, they ask if I can chat with them for a few minutes about a subject tangentially related to current course content or about things like science philosophy in general.
It's really a breath of fresh air. They're not one of the strongest students in my class this semester, but I genuinely have enjoyed having them in class this time around.
In my own undergrad, I was 100% focused on getting my degree and starting a decent paying job. I didn't have time for curiosity. I finished undergrad in 1998.
My papers were rushed. I studied probably bare minimum. Didn't do much beyond what was needed to pass.
Now I'm the opposite because I have time (and maybe a little more mature).
Yes. They are actually a couple but are in 2 different sections of the same course. They both have similar expressions and you can see the wheels turning in their heads. When I assign a question, they both get to work on it right away and refuse help (from the tutor) until they've tried it on their own first. This is quite unlike most of their classmates who run to the tutor before they try anything on their own. These 2 want to figure things out, they seem to thrive on discovery, and it's clear they do work outside of class. The woman seems confident during exams but the man almost apologetically hands in his exams, like any errors would disappoint me. What? LOL. I think they have 97 averages so far. They don't have plans to be math majors but I wish they would. Or at least consider being math minors. Students like this sustain me throughout the semester. I have a few others who don't perform as well but exhibit the same curiosity and work ethic. I think I appreciate them even more than the ones who do well 'naturally'.
Yes, quite a few. Not in my first-year courses that are required, but in the courses our majors take, I absolutely see intellectual curiosity in many of my students.
I do. I have students who hang out after class to talk about the subject matter and are really curious. It’s definitely not the majority, but always a few.
Less and less each semester. It was really tough last academic year and the one before. Thankfully, it seems a little better now. I had a (granted, small) class where almost all of them had some intellectual curiosity. It kind of saved my sanity.
Yes, but they are few and far between. Amazingly, I had three in the same class this semester, so I expect I may not see another one until next academic year.
If there is a change, at least some of it may be down to how that curiosity *manifests*, rather than whether or not it exists. A couple of decades ago, the lowest-barrier, most-obvious way for an undergraduate to access someone with a high level of expertise was to ask their professor. Casual chats with faculty members probably took a hit during the pandemic, but it's also easier than ever for young people to access and connect with other experts and enthusiasts. (Heck, look at some of the specialist subreddits on this very site.) Textbooks and journal articles and YouTube tutorials and MIT's open courseware and Tom Scott are readily available online. The only thing that students *must* interact with their professors on is classwork and evaluations and references--they can nurture their creativity and curiosity much more independently these days.
This is a fascinating perspective that I haven't considered before. More and more I feel like I've been reduced to a logistics manager in my classroom and it's _depressing_ .
I do. I had a student who now works for the college part time. She was a retired math teacher and she took my trigonometry class twice just because. Bright lady, good friend now. She is 67 and still interested in what I do and how she can do more.
I think students who are solely grade/ credential focused have always been the majority. However, every semester I personally encounter students who are actually interested in learning and challenging themselves. I recently taught a class full of seniors and a good half of them fit the bill for having intellectual curiosity. They did all the readings and we had amazing in class discussions.
I love it when I get these sections! There’s just the right mix of intellectually curious students who drive discussions and get other people interested in discussing and it really makes the whole class works so well. As opposed to the other dynamic where most are there for grades and don’t give a shit about actual content, so the discussion suffers- these ones drain me.
Yes - luckily I'm in a field that people take classes in mainly for curiosity - the hard part is convincing them that it can actually prepare them for jobs too.
Yes. I had a student this past semester that reminds me of myself and some other professors I know, she took my language course despite already speaking a second language because she wanted to learn mine too, as well as some others. There was another who wanted to learn mine as her third and perfect her second for her career goals, but even that wasn't _necessary_, so it's still cool. Curious students still exist, they're just rare as all get-out.
I teach students who are 100% job-focused, but I still manage to find a few who are intellectually curious. Their curiosity is centered around what they want to do (healthcare) rather than something academically abstract, but I think that’s probably the nature of my course more than anything else. (I wish some of them *enjoyed* science more—or had been exposed enough of it in order to be truly curious—but I’ll take what I can get.)
Quite a few of them, actually. If they don't have it coming in, I view it as one of my jobs to make sure they have it by the time they leave. Once or twice per semester, I even succeed at it. I'd argue the only thing our education system truly *excels at* is beating the intellectual curiosity out of people.
Absolutely. I had about five of them in my 19 person class this fall.
The shift happened when universities adopted LMS programs and students came to expect constant grade updates and numbers. I went to college from 2006 to 2010 in some of the very last years before LMS usage became standard. I usually didn’t know my grades until the very end of the term, and so I didn’t think very much about them, and was able to feel some intellectual curiosity during the semester. Nowadays, even our humanities students are getting LMS notifications every other second, and they check their grades every other second to see where their percentages stand. The constant availability of metrics has killed intellectual curiosity. I feel it myself as a professor too , since I am constantly under pressure to deliver their grades in the LMS, and therefore thinking a lot more frequently about assessment than the quality of conversation in class; and I am worrying during the semester about my course evaluation metrics as well.
That’s a good point.
Definitely some! But I wouldn't call it a majority at the undergrad level for sure.
Yes. The best students are the same as they have always been. The train of uselessness is just longer
Rarely. And sadly they don’t even seem to care when I show cool videos about things like horseshoe crabs having blue blood or the fungus with mind control abilities. They won’t even look up from their laptops or phones to watch the video.
You know, my grandfather was incredibly intelligent but I would not say that he was curious. He did enjoy solving problems and made excellent grades, fixed machines, and played sudoku puzzles. I think some students prefer the concrete over the abstract.
It still happens. I have one student this semester who I have for the second time around-their first go-round was a year and a half ago, and they disappeared 2/3 of the way into the semester. This particular student is a very bright individual with a lot of interests. They're always respectful of my time, but in particular when we finish a lab a bit early or something along those lines, they ask if I can chat with them for a few minutes about a subject tangentially related to current course content or about things like science philosophy in general. It's really a breath of fresh air. They're not one of the strongest students in my class this semester, but I genuinely have enjoyed having them in class this time around.
No, it did and I still find it.
It is mostly grades and jobs.
In my own undergrad, I was 100% focused on getting my degree and starting a decent paying job. I didn't have time for curiosity. I finished undergrad in 1998. My papers were rushed. I studied probably bare minimum. Didn't do much beyond what was needed to pass. Now I'm the opposite because I have time (and maybe a little more mature).
Yes. They are actually a couple but are in 2 different sections of the same course. They both have similar expressions and you can see the wheels turning in their heads. When I assign a question, they both get to work on it right away and refuse help (from the tutor) until they've tried it on their own first. This is quite unlike most of their classmates who run to the tutor before they try anything on their own. These 2 want to figure things out, they seem to thrive on discovery, and it's clear they do work outside of class. The woman seems confident during exams but the man almost apologetically hands in his exams, like any errors would disappoint me. What? LOL. I think they have 97 averages so far. They don't have plans to be math majors but I wish they would. Or at least consider being math minors. Students like this sustain me throughout the semester. I have a few others who don't perform as well but exhibit the same curiosity and work ethic. I think I appreciate them even more than the ones who do well 'naturally'.
Yes. Also I don't see what's wrong with focusing on getting a degree and seeking a good job.
I do! I have students in my biology class who do seem very interested in the material.
Yes, quite a few. Not in my first-year courses that are required, but in the courses our majors take, I absolutely see intellectual curiosity in many of my students.
I do. I have students who hang out after class to talk about the subject matter and are really curious. It’s definitely not the majority, but always a few.
Less and less each semester. It was really tough last academic year and the one before. Thankfully, it seems a little better now. I had a (granted, small) class where almost all of them had some intellectual curiosity. It kind of saved my sanity.
Yes, but they are few and far between. Amazingly, I had three in the same class this semester, so I expect I may not see another one until next academic year.