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[quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous][quote=Anonymous]are students more or less prepared academically than 5.10.20 and 30 years ago?[/quote]

Much less prepared now. Very dependent on computers. Very distracted by everything. Some act like they’ve never been in a library. Many cannot write 2 pages much less 20. When giving a blue book for exams their handwriting is atrocious. They expect retakes and grade changes instead of showing up and doing work. They request notes instead of taking them in class. The list goes on and on. [/quote]

I have been teaching for nearly 20 years at an R1 university and I haven't noticed any of this, except distraction.  Distraction has grown in the past 5-10 years and is an issue.  I now regularly open with a discussion in the course on strategies for maintaining attention for learning and revisit it if/when students seem to be struggling with it.

I would say, library research skills have grown with the tools.  A far larger percentage of students know how to find quality, peer-reviewed work, use more sources, and know how to critically analyze them than they did when I was starting out.  I used to have to spend more time teaching this in a more remedial way. I think the K-12 schools are building these skills more than they used to.

I don't really think about students' handwriting as an important part of learning--most of what they submit to me is digital.  99% of academic and professional work is done on computers--not sure why we would expect them not to be "dependent" on them.

Surprisingly, I have seen gains in public presentation skills over the years.  I think more K-12 schools regularly have students do oral/group presentations and it shows in the college years.

Writing skills are more variable than they used to be.  The strongest students are as strong as they have ever been; the weakest are worse than they used to be.  (Except multi-lingual English learners--the tools have helped them improve a lot). I think there is more variable writing support/feedback in K-12 schools than there used to be, and more casual forms of writing are practiced every day through texting and social media.

I've seen an increase in use of AI and I can tell the tone/voice shifts when students try to amend the text to avoid being "caught" by software.  Rather than outright forbidding AI, I have a policy that they need to cite any usage of a tool for writing and clarify what contributions were from the tool(s) and what were from them and that I consider uncited use of tools plagiarism. This seems to dissuade students as it adds extra work, but a few international students use the tools and are thoughtful in clarifying how. I give feedback on whether I think the use is supporting their learning or not.

The mental health concerns that spiked in the pandemic and immediately after seem to be waning.  Also, ever year I see more accommodation requests for disabilities, but now fewer students actually use them.  It's almost like they put in the request as a "safety net" so if they need more time they can use it, but most seem to have a handle on it.  I've also shifted my practice away to give ample time for everyone to do their best work on a test so this may be a factor as 'time on tests' is the most common accommodation.
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