Life of the mind often distracted

To study or not to study, that is the collegiate paradox.

Facebook. Playstation. AIM. Online poker. Students have a wealth of distractions at their fingertips.

“It is hard to stay away from distractions because when all your friends go somewhere you don’t want to be the one kid that stays behind in the dorm doing work,” said Chris Caporale ’09. “I often find myself doing things like AIM and Facebook more than work. It’s extremely hard to settle down and focus on work right now.”

Andrew Collins ’08 agreed.

“Technological items now located in almost every room, like instant messaging, watching TV or DVDs, using things like i-Tunes and Facebook, playing X-Box and Playstation 2 all make work difficult,” he said.

Administrators here agree that distractions are a major concern.

“Student distractions that effect students’ abilities to learn, positively or negatively, affect the faculty’s ability to bring them brightest futures,” said Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences Timothy Snyder. “We have tried to combat the general trend of students emphasizing short-term events, like parties, over long term, life enhancements, like learning and exploring life opportunities, through several programs.”

“I have changed the way I approach students and parents and what I discuss with them at orientation, at Parents’ Weekend and even at admissions events, trying to help them understand that this is probably the only time in our students’ lives for them to immerse fully in what we call ‘the life of the mind,'” he said.

In order to study the effect these distractions have on students, the University has participated in the National Survey of Student Engagement (NSSE) for the last two years.

“The survey allows for administration to gain insight in areas of collegiate quality where we can use the data collected to make improvements in areas Fairfield U. is lacking,” said Amy Boczer, of Fairfield University Institutional Research. “The survey is also a tool that we can use to enhance our admissions analysis that we do generate on a yearly basis.”

Boczer said the NSSE helps to gain information on the overall student experience and allows Fairfield to make determinations accordingly such as engaging students and the effectiveness of teachers.

In spring 2004, the freshman class of ’07 and senior class of ’04 were surveyed. In the spring of 2005, both the freshman class of ’08 and senior class of ’05 were surveyed, according to Director of Management Information Phyllis Fitzpatrick.

The freshmen polled spent as much, if not more, time relaxing, socializing and participating in non-academic activities than studying or academic related work.

“In some areas of engagement we are doing well against our peers.” said Fitzpatrick. “In other areas we are not the norm.”

“The results are complicated,” she added.

In a similar poll done in 2002 given to graduating seniors by the Higher Educational Research Institute, 35 percent of students spent fewer than 6 hours studying each week and only 5 percent did more than 20 hours of studying a week.

Nationwide, 27.8 percent of students partied more than six hours a week, but at Fairfield 67.8 percent partied more than six hours a week, according to the 2002 study. Some 41 percent of Fairfield students also felt bored in class, compared to 26 percent nationally.

“I probably spend nine or ten hours a week on work unless I have a paper or something due in which it might be 13 or 14,” said Tony Galatano ’07.