Lit but Light: Insights from Teaching Gen Z – Part 1
The Swipe Generation is coming. They’ve already infiltrated your company as interns. Some have even secured entry-level creative positions. Whether you’re a Gen Z innovator or about to become an early adopter, you might want to know what to expect. In my role as an instructor teaching Digital Design and Creative Concepting at the undergraduate level at Colorado University Boulder, I’ve been surprised, disappointed and delighted by Gen Z.
My students are creative and bold, but conservative and sometimes fragile. Having prompted a few tears, I learned how and when, to deliver critical feedback. Social embarrassment is their greatest fear. They are more cautious than I would have expected, given CU Boulder’s national reputation as a party school. Gen Z is the digital generation, and they carefully manage their online persona and take their privacy seriously. They prefer to live in the moment instead of “perma-sharing,” hence the preference for Snapchat and direct messaging.
I gave students the task of creating a prototype app that would bring to life the experience of specifying a genetically enhanced human fetus–A “designer baby.” 23 and me was the fictitious client. A methodical selection tool, a game, or a realistic depiction wrapped in a cautionary tale were all acceptable interpretations. The issue behind this assignment is polarizing to say the least. Is it unethical, amoral? The implications for the human race are many–bad and good–the temptation Crispr offers is too powerful to deny. In fact, before we completed the assignment, the first genetically augmented humans were allegedly born in China.
There were a fantastic range of student concepts, from a dystopian world, where future parents are incented to modify their offspring reflecting the needs of the corporation, to a dating app that allowed participants to explore their future offspring–It also arranged their marriage as a prerequisite to tailored conception. The majority of students found creative ways to avoid the direct task of ‘playing god,’ as depicted in the movie Gattaca. For me, this reflected some well-established ethics but also a degree of conservatism.
When presenting to a classroom of peers, Gen Z most certainly does not want to be embarrassed by sweat. And by that I mean effort, not sweatpants. Times change. I wore a suit and tie to some of my final presentations in school. I even cut off the tail of my mullet for the big finale. Not so today, where I’ve felt compelled to intervene on the habit of wearing pajamas on presentation day. To their credit, my students seem to take suggestions constructively. Gen Z is driven to succeed, but they want everything look effortless. The ideal is not entirely new, but is in sharp contrast to the old-school practice of doing every little thing to make the work appear better– and get credit for it. Silly, try-hard GenXer.
This first week of the new semester, I asked my classes, “What drives your passion for design / advertising?” One common theme was “all the bad work out there.” The motivating opportunity for improvement, being implied of course. So don’t worry, Gen Z is coming to the rescue. I do admire their complicated confidence.
