When I was in undergrad, my peers and I were ambitious risk-takers, always looking for opportunities to make our mark. This youthful and wide-eyed approach toward our education and our campus experience allowed us to learn about our capabilities and test our limits. We were able to reflect on the risks that we took and either figure out what we did wrong and recalibrate or recognize what we did right and log it as a win. Campus was a place where students were simultaneously emboldened by their ideas and humbled by those who challenged them.
Today, instead of the college campus being a place where you begin to understand how much you know and how much you don’t know, it is a place where you just “don’t.” You don’t offer your opinion unless it agrees with the professor and a majority of students in your class. You don’t tweet a joke that could be misunderstood and get you “canceled.” You don’t challenge the status quo; you just “don’t.”
