The Chronicle of Higher Education has a story about the debate surrounding how to best teach “Millenials.” These are the latest generation of college students, the children of baby boomers, and how are generally characterized as smart but impatient, having grown up with all types of electronic and consumer devices, having limited attention spans, and wanting immediate results. The question for academics is, should we change the way we teach to accommodate their preferences:

Change your teaching style. Make blogs, iPods, and video games part of your pedagogy. And learn to accept divided attention spans. A new generation of students has arrived -- and sorry, but they might not want to hear you lecture for an hour. That is the message of Richard T. Sweeney, university librarian at the New Jersey Institute of Technology, who has been hitting the lecture circuit lately with his vision of how today’s college students . . .

Not everyone agrees that Millennials are so different from their predecessors, or that, even if they are different, educational techniques should change accordingly. Michael Gorman, dean of library services at California State University at Fresno and president of the American Library Association, doesn’t believe in generalizing about generations. . . .

He points to a recent article in Educause Review, about generational differences, in which a Millennial says, “If higher education listened to me, faculty and administrators would understand that students today cannot be dedicated just to learning.” The comment sounds “self-absorbed” and “inane,” Mr. Gorman says, and educators should not have to pander to such views.

As with any other issue, there are two sides to the story here. On the one hand, I understand the need to tailor one’s teaching to the needs and capabilities of your audience. When something isn’t working or when your students are not adequately learning, it is worthless to keep doing the same things over and over again and expecting different results.

On the other hand, there’s also something to be said for academic rigor -- challenging students to engage with material that they may not find the most exciting, or making sure that you as the professor do a thorough job in presenting important material without having to compromise its integrity.

In the end, as with most issues, there can be a middle ground. Specific situations will require different solutions of course, but there are likely to be several effective ways to combine academic rigor with accommodating students’ learning styles. Time marches on, and the one constant is change . . .