| Time Flies |
8 September 2003
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Beloit College -- What the Freshmen Know
One of the best things about the academic year starting is a contribution that little Beloit College in Wisconsin started issuing a few years ago -- its list of what the current freshman class has experienced. Having railed against PR-based lists rather recently, the Kensington Review is thrilled by this exception to the rule, because it underlines how dramatic change is, some for good some for ill. Those who want the full list may find it here.
Some of the list merely reflects the passage of time, making the reader feel older. For example, to the class of 2007, Sir Richard Burton has always been dead. Other things are trivial; to those kids, "car detailing has always been available." Some, though, are a bit more significant, encapsulating dramatic change; "The Jaycees have always welcomed women as members," as near as they can remember.
What the list illustrates, though, is that change and progress are not too closely related. While there can be no progress without change, change is often a neutral force. Life is not necessarily improved, nor is it worsened -- it merely becomes different. The class of 2007 has always been able to fly Virgin Atlantic to London; but gone are British Caledonian, BOAC and Pan Am. The progress lies in the fact that they can fly there at all.
As astonishing as some of the list is, it is nothing compared to what the class of 1907 went through before they passed on -- from horse and buggy to moon landing in a single lifetime, the death of European empires, the rise fascism and its fall. Millions killed to purify the race, millions saved because of penicillin
Taking the next generation to school to learn what they need is a rite of autumn, whether it is graduate school or nursery school. What Beloit College's list teaches is the one certainty the future holds; it will be different, better one hopes, but of that there is no guarantee.
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