What change will take

Something that we talk about a lot at The Stute is why things at Stevens never seem to change. Many things do change — the students, the faculty, the buildings, and the programs offered. But perhaps just as many things don’t change; we see it when we read an old Stute article from 10 years ago or even 100 years ago and it’s still relevant to life at Stevens in 2020.

Lack of change isn’t necessarily bad. Sometimes there is a reason why certain systems and procedures exist, and upon review, they may indeed be the best way to do things. But repeatedly recognizing the same issues is probably a sign that some sort of change does need to be implemented.

We all hope that things will change with time, that way maybe we won’t have to do anything to see it get fixed. That works for some relationships, maybe. Some people are more sympathetic and forgetful, therefore forgiving over time. But others hold grudges and grow even more hostile. Sometimes, we see small improvements over the years, and with time, they build up! But in other times, we see the same problems cyclically appear, as if time never passed. While waiting for change is reasonable in certain instances, it might not be the best plan if you want immediate or big change.

When waiting doesn’t work, you have to do something to make the change you’re envisioning happen. You have to identify your needs and communicate your vision of change. It should be done respectfully and through the appropriate channels, obviously. If I want my professor to change my grade, I wouldn’t go to the Board of Trustees. If I want the SGA to change, I wouldn’t go to the Honor Board about it. You have to gather your evidence and your most articulate team members to negotiate why the change you want to see is in line with what the person signing off on changes wants.

But what if all this doesn’t work? What if we try to create change, have all the evidence that change makes the most sense, but the change-approvers aren’t receptive? This happened at one of my internships. The business system owner who approved changes was like a gatekeeper for his system. He was the one who decided whether changes were valid or not, but he was a very skeptical and conservative guy, hostile to change. We have plenty of gatekeepers at Stevens that are so similar to this guy that I basically consider them walls. But stubborn people, like walls, can be moved with enough push and collective effort.

Things change more easily when people have empathy and listen with an open heart. I love being on the School of Business’ advisory board because the staff always listen to students with an open heart and are honest with us, letting us know if our suggestions are impossible. I loved my last internship because they would constantly ask me for ideas and trusted me to look at problems in new ways to broaden their perspective before making decisions. The whole world isn’t like that though because not everyone is open-minded. People only listen if they want to, and only to people they like. The concept of liking someone and being a “good person” is also ambiguous, relative to whether your beliefs are in line with theirs and if your actions are convenient and beneficial to their goals. So, people only change if they believe it’s convenient to them.

I think the main problems we face here at Stevens are that:

(1) Many people are waiting for the changes they want to see. This is fine for some situations, but in other situations it’s not enough for people to realize that you want anything changed. If you don’t submit a work order that you have mice in Davis, Facilities won’t know to come. Simple.

(2) You need to work really hard for change. You must be resilient and passionate, an inspiration to students and an ally to change-approvers. If we give up when it gets tough, then we are back to square one. This is precisely why we see the same problems at Stevens literally all the time, because people graduate and efforts to create change are reset and forgotten until they pop up again.

(3) Change-approvers need to recognize that an open mind and a broad range of perspectives is in their best interest. There is no reason to be hostile to change or restrict opinions at the table to only those you feel “comfortable” with. Real change can only happen when you change the people who make decisions. Either your mind needs to change or eventually you will be changed, meaning, you’ll be fired.

This isn’t a message to anyone specific. Things will change here only if people who have problems are vocal about them — problems with us to me, problems with the school to Student Life, problems with their professors to their bosses, problems with your club president directly to your president’s face. The more people you can get to make a case, the better. And then, the change-approver is left in a position where they have to listen to you. If you sit around and do nothing, the problems don’t just graduate away, as many people hope they will. They’ll just be someone else’s problems 5, 10, 50 years down the line, and the same-old is what The Stute will be writing about.