Campus culture is central to building a sense of community at Stevens and giving the school its identity. I often wonder whether Stevens is losing some of that culture, especially given the current state of our campus and student life. This article is purely opinion-based and draws on what I’ve observed while exploring old Stute issues, SITTV and OffCenterComedy videos, library archives, and Link archives, which I believe offer some of the best glimpses into Stevens’ past culture, as well as my observations of the current state of student organizations. I can’t help but wonder: Are we losing Stevens culture?
To give you a glimpse into what I’ve seen, looking through the lens of old media may offer a different perspective on Stevens culture. In the past, people seemed more carefree and willing to be witty, spontaneous, and unfiltered. Most of the videos and articles I’ve explored come from the 2000s through 2018, and even some from the 1900s, when people may not have worried as much about constant online visibility or the fear of being judged.
Watching these videos, I often wonder whether the advancement of technology has made us more conscious of how we are perceived by others. As online opinions spread quickly, it sometimes feels like we are constantly being evaluated by our peers. I wonder whether this pressure has made us more cautious about how we express ourselves, causing us to lose some of the spontaneity and authenticity that once made campus culture more alive.
Stevens is a very stressful school, especially considering its demanding workload. I’m grateful to be getting an education from such a program, but that does not come without the countless hours needed to keep up with the coursework. That’s speaking as a business major. I cannot fathom the amount of work engineering students have to deal with, but I digress. Though this has always been the case, and Stevens has always been challenging, we have still managed to maintain some sort of culture in the past.
The ongoing pressure has made student leaders’ roles harder to fulfill, especially as students deal with external factors such as political conflicts, economic uncertainty, new immigration policies, feeling like their concerns go unheard, and weak job market reports. This may be going beyond the scope of the article, but I think it is safe to assume that, with all these external factors demanding students’ attention, they may not have the privilege of completely devoting themselves to maintaining campus culture. They are instead trying their best to create, change, or combat these factors.
Along with that, technology can truly be a blessing, such as the kiosk and Piccolo Italia food lockers making food pickup so much more efficient. However, does too much digital technology and efficiency come at the cost of less connection? With how easy it is to pick up your food at UCC once it marks it as ready and scurry back to your dorm, you lose out on the opportunity to sit in a community space and make conversation with others; rather, you might scroll on your phone while waiting. I do this too, I won’t lie, but overall, there has been a feeling of less community because of this.
I have no idea if my reminiscing on the past is also romanticizing it, but there is just too notable a difference between my first year and junior year here that I couldn’t help but write about this. Student leaders are not really associating with their clubs as they used to. Maintaining a club is also becoming more tiresome, with more restrictions, which comes at the cost of turning clubs from an activity of enjoyment to just another job. To compensate for all the external factors in their lives, students work extra hard. It’s difficult to expect everyone to be involved when all of us deal with so much as college students, yet it’s still frustrating to experience this loss of culture. But then again, this may be completely relative to me. Who knows? That’s my spiel for now.
