College President Jim Yong Kim has encouraged Dartmouth students to do great things in many of his speeches. The catchphrase that has been repeatedly emphasized is a statement originally made by former College President John Sloan Dickey: Students should "make the world's problems their own. Every time I hear this quote, I find myself wondering, what exactly does it mean?
It's obvious that Kim's intent was to use this call to action to inspire passion in students. However, after hearing this statement, I often feel confused about the expectation being placed on Dartmouth students.
Kim's favorite saying surely sounds nice to parents hoping their money is being put to good use, alumni beaming down at their alma mater and prospective students who are looking for a life-changing experience. It does not sound as nice to many current students, though, who have enough trouble dealing with their own problems (midterms anyone?), let alone the world's problems. How exactly are we supposed to make the world's problems our own? The ambiguity of this statement leads to misunderstanding, and encourages some students to approach the world's problems from the wrong perspective.
First, this statement seems to encourage students to focus on macro-level problems like poverty, the American education system or health care in the third world. While we should be thinking about these societal issues, we are approaching them in the wrong way. Our focus on the complex problems of the world too often diverts our attention away from the small problems we encounter on a daily basis at the micro level.
While we embrace grand initiatives to promote global health, domestic social justice and international human rights, some students on our campus still don't do simple humanistic things, like being kind to members of certain Greek houses or holding the door open for the person behind them. There are walking contradictions on this campus who promote pacifism and world peace but simultaneously care more about social status than treating fellow students with respect. Unfortunately, we are so preoccupied with saving the forest that we don't even notice the trees being cut down right in front of our eyes. Dartmouth places little or no emphasis on the small problems that could not only be more easily remedied, but when taken altogether, actually contribute to making the world around us a better place.
Another problem I have with making the world's troubles my own is that it places too much emphasis on individual accomplishment. Leadership is constantly promoted at Dartmouth. While leadership is almost always viewed in a positive light, many times I have seen it do more harm than good. Leadership has become such a buzzword in society today that many people become leaders solely for the sake of leadership, not because they have a true desire to strongly commit to a cause. Many times I have seen leadership positions transform passionate and cooperative people into people too busy to be bothered and more focused on their own self-promotion than the actual cause.
For this reason, Dartmouth shouldn't strive so hard to create "leaders" we should instead create passionate workers who want to collaborate for change. We should create people who want to get their hands dirty and contribute a small part to affecting change even without recognition, not people who want to sit in an office all day and write checks to non-profits. There are certainly people out there who can be both a leader and a worker. However, these people didn't enter into a cause because they wanted to be in the spotlight. They became leaders through a natural progression of events, and didn't lose sight of the issue.
The expectation of a Dartmouth student shouldn't be to become a larger-than-life leader with a halo around his head, solving the world's problems while posing for magazine covers. The expectation should be that we become kind and considerate individuals who are aware of our surroundings and cognizant of which actions create change and which actions are futile. A Dartmouth student should approach the world's problems realistically, from the bottom-up, and take things in small strides. While it's good to dream big and have high expectations for ourselves, we shouldn't feel the burden of the world on our shoulders when we graduate. We should focus on fixing what's in front of us, with our eyes to the sky but our feet on the ground.
