Hilal Nakiboglu: Misnomer for a generation

Yesterday, members of Penn's campus community left behind their offices and classrooms. Many contributed to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr.'s legacy of love by committing themselves to a day of service in his name. Several of the scheduled campus projects enjoyed respectable levels of participation. It is heartening that this interest in service was not limited to our campus. School papers across the country from UCLA's Daily Bruin to the Yale Daily News described students engaged in acts of aid and caring. This isn't surprising. The fact is college students in this country are sensitive to the social welfare of others. And it is unfortunate that we are routinely projected as being otherwise. We've all heard the hallowed clich‚s. Perhaps some of us have even internalized them. Generations X and beyond are supposed to be a self-interested group of people. We are expected to show little real regard for others. Our seniors have defined us as being perpetually bored, skeptical and cynical. The label "Generation X" itself comes, in fact, from a book of the same name. In it, author Douglas Coupland chronicles the lives of three strangers who are detached from the rest of society, spiritless and frustrated. It seems we've collectively been named after a couple of underachievers with shallow lives. How fair is this? I say not very. According to a recent study published by the Higher Education Research Institute, about 83 percent of our national Class of 2005 performs some sort of regular community service. This number is up from 66 percent just a decade ago. The U.S. Department of Education also believes that today's young adults are givers. In 1997, it reported that six million of us volunteer our time to charitable organizations. Compare this to the year 1984 when that number didn't even hit one million. Why the bad rep then? How did we get stuck being known as the "Me Generation?" John Calhoun, founder of a nonprofit program called Youth as Resources, contends, "This generation is just amazing in terms of its desire to give.... It's part of their lives, and it's very different from a generation ago." A generation ago, our parents came into their own through civil rights and peace movements of the time. Thanks to passionate, organized mass efforts, they became recognized as a concerned group willing to stand up for the protection of others. Today, these baby boomers have passed along their convictions to us. They are running our businesses, schools, governments and families in a new way. As Calhoun says, they've helped insert service into our daily lives. Thanks to them, more than half of American public high schools require us to participate in some community service before handing out a diploma. In our schools and homes, we learn early on the necessity and benefits of benevolence. Rebellion in the traditional sense is no longer a must for us, thanks largely to the actions they've taken. Today, youth involvement isn't synonymous with political action. Rather, it has remolded itself to mean humanitarianism and philanthropy. There is no one said cause that we all work for. We don't have a civil rights or feminist liberation movement of quite the same scale. What we do have, however, are the same good intentions for social justice and tolerance. Perhaps this dispersion of energy is partly the reason our efforts are often slighted. The argument is out there that those of us belonging to the "Generation Without a Conscience" serve because we have to, not want to. With college entrance more competitive than ever, we volunteer in the hopes that we'll stand out amongst our peers. Call me Pollyanna, but I just don't believe this is the case. It is fair to point out that though many of us might volunteer, few dedicate an actual career to public service -- especially at Penn. My hunch is those who shy away from lower-paying jobs do so not because they don't like the idea of helping others but because they have a mammoth student loan bill to pay off. This needn't be the case. At Harvard University last week, President Lawrence Summers introduced a new program that he hopes will support students interested in serving the public good. By offering scholarships as well as loans much below the market rate, Summers has taken a noble and important step. Often, graduate students on track to a money-making career are granted lower-cost financial aid. This program, offered through Citicorp, will level the playing field for those willing to advance the public good through their work. A decade from now, it will be exciting to see the results of Summers' actions. My guess is Harvard will have much to be proud of. Dr. King once said, "Everybody can be great because anybody can serve." My hope is that Penn will follow suit, supporting the deserving anybody for the collective everybody. Hilal Nakiboglu is a second-year doctoral student in Higher Education Management from Ankara, Turkey.

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