I am loving the incredibly rich conversations I have had lately about the colliding of worlds Facebook is bringing about for people. So many faculty, technologists, family, friends, etc. have all mentioned or brought up recently the idea of identity.
I'll use my mom as an example, hopefully she won't mind - she's on FB so most my "Friends" see her anyway. Here she is as a college President who, my entire life, would never even go to the grocery store in sweats or take out her trash in anything less than "acceptable" dress. Literally, and sometimes we lived as far away as 30 minutes from her schools. She always said as an administrator you never know who you will bump into. So imagine my surprise when she took the plunge into Facebook. She has had fun connecting with old friends, current friends, my friends, my brother's friends, and wait....even her collegues. That is where her questions started coming up...her Chancellor is a "Friend" and recently commented at a live meeting..."I've seen Linda's grandchildren!" Her worlds have suddenly collided.
Are "worlds" colliding? Or are we redefining our "worlds"? I think we are redefining. Our students perceive relationships very differently than Baby Boomers who have historically had very different personas. Non-millennials are attempting to place their perception of self, their clearly defined relationships, inside and environment like Facebook. A dilemma poignantly illustrated here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=nrlSkU0TFLs All the while Millennials are forming their perceptions of self and of relationships in FB. For younger generations there are no "borders" being crossed as those borders look very different from their perspective.
A comment recently made to me by a colleague suggested a possible exception...what, she said, of when the "Dean of Admissions" Googles students to consider admitting them to their college and there are posts of "sexual harassment" or something...she said "sexual harassment is sexual harassment" it will affect their decision regardless what generation they are. We've seen it happen already time and again.
To this I suggest two thoughts..first, when that "Dean of Admissions" is no longer a Baby Boomer but a Millennial it will not matter, because they will be seeing these references from a very different perspective. Currently, we are inflicting Baby Boomer perspectives on Millennial frameworks. The current "Deans of Admissions" and other non-Millennial decision makers need to practice that which we preach. Not all "resources" are valid resources. As teachers, we do not accept, Wikipedia for example, as a valid source for reliable information. Why on earth, would anyone accept Facebook comments, or blog posts, as a valid source for major decisions?
What Face do you wear? Might you consider a new look?
