The shifting mission of Duke and its students

At some point during the countless hours we spend in the depths of Perkins during the midterm season, our wandering minds contemplate in one way or another the purpose of our university education. The time we work on classes, research, extracurricular interests and the like all cohere to become an increasingly in-focus and anxiety-inducing picture of what we want our futures to be. Today we turn to an interpretation of Duke’s mission for students and the realities those students face in post-graduation plans.

Outlined in the current strategic plan as an enduring theme of the University, knowledge in the service of society is about “harnessing the power of higher learning for the larger social good.” While many students embrace this raison d’etre through service-learning courses, local volunteering, and service programs like DukeEngage, still a huge percentage of students find themselves starting off in banking and consulting in which they have little long-term interest. Even as we acknowledge these students may go on to change careers and find more traditionally rewarding pursuits, we ask today why the critical thinking and hard work those industries saddle entry level positions with cannot be found by students at university so that they can cut to the chase after graduation.

Year after year, the job placements of seniors upon graduation suggest many students are opting for financial stable or tried and true career paths instead of service-oriented positions or more generally passion-driven careers. The ideal, almost Renaissance college student aims for well-roundedness and sufficient means to provide themselves and their own. However fueled by the rising cost of college and increasingly confusing diversity of career options, the trend has been towards students finding anything their upperclassmen peers can advise them about or something their parents will be happy with.

At first, we might guess that these influences are rooted in a certain socioeconomic background, but this to not be the case. Wealthier students may currently be financially secure enough to freely explore majors that are not lucrative, but they may also face pressure to match the quality of living they grew up with. On the other hand, students from less wealthy backgrounds may either seek careers that allow for more social mobility or be more willing to explore the world outside the upper echelons of society. Not only are there flip-sides to all these stories, but they grossly oversimplify our student body. The decision must be a product of something about students’ time at Duke.

Coming out of Duke, there is almost a consumer anxiety to our career choices. Our student body is told from Orientation Week about its potential. In turn, Duke allows students to experience a high quality of student life on campus. Academically, it promotes self-discovery inside and outside the classroom. It also introduces students to an elite environment of renowned faculty and program resources. To some extent, the choices on campus may cease to provide comfort and start to increase anxiety, causing the practical, financial and the knowledge-seeking, passion or service drives within us compete. The cacophony of what we can learn, how we can spend our summers and what we can put our mid-twenties towards should scare us a little bit. Unfortunately without some unified foundation to the university experience like the religious or philosophically intellectual messages of old, pre-professional tracks can offer us something concrete and self-servingly rational.

We should hope, financial and non-negotiable burdens aside, that those students who cannot answer why they are pursuing that internship or how they chose their major should do some soul-searching about what service Duke is rendering to them. Universities aim to educate, and we should aim to learn. Ultimately, the University must encourage us to consciously consider our individual academic missions, and we have to be willing to do so.