OUTHERN S The Student Voice of Florida Southern College
Non Profit Org. US Postage PAID Permit 38 Lakeland, FL
FRIDAY, November 16, 2018 VOL. 133, NO. 6
Dr. Kerr, LPD speaks to Spivey residents Peter Edgar Editor-in-Chief President Dr. Anne Kerr and Lakeland Assistant Chief of Police Rick Taylor spoke to the residents of Allan Spivey Hall in their lobby at the beginning of November regarding the college’s and the state’s policies following a string of incidents over the past two months. Kerr called on students to act as a better community based on the history and the expectations of the college. Taylor, in turn, spoke about the real-world legal repercussions of the things the department of Student Accountability has been working to resolve. “We’re going to have to work on an exit plan for some of these people who are so disrespectful to other people,” Kerr said. “We’re going to ask your help in identifying those young men who may not have the character or the maturity to be in this community; they might not fit this mold of excellence that we have at Florida Southern—the majority, the 99.9 percent of you do.” The meeting was attended by the nearentirety of Spivey Hall, including Resident Advisors and Community Directors. Amanda Blount and Maggie Merryday, Assistant Dean of Student Development and Assistant Director of Accountability, Education, and Compliance, respectively, also attended. Over the past semester, Student Accountability, the Resident Advisor team, the Residential Life department, Student Development, the Safety office and Facilities Maintenance have all been involved in dealing with the repercussions of negative student action. Events have ranged from severe damage to restroom facilities like sinks and toilet seats and the removal of fire exit sign designations to events, threatening notes
Photos by Reems Landreth
President Anne Kerr speaks to students at Town Hall. and a dildo taped to the door of Resident Advisors and students who are members of the LGBTQ community, which each speaker chose to address differently. “We haven’t had this problem since I’ve been at Florida Southern,” Kerr said. “This is my 14th year. Regardless of how you feel politically and what your likes and dislikes may be, or your level of tolerance, we’re in this community together.” “When we start talking about being disrespectful to other people with
differences—” the language that Kerr used “—see, in my world, I call that harassment… There’s hate crimes,” Taylor said. “Depending on what you’re doing… it can actually be a felony.” Kerr began by outlining the legacy of the college as a whole, noting the kinds of people—-a secretary general of OPEC, an executive vice president of NASCAR, and various noted athletes—who lived in Spivey Hall at one point. The students present were selected Out
of thousands of applicants, Kerr said, and should act within the awareness of that privilege. She also appealed to the financial burden that many families face when the cost of repairing damages is distributed over the entire building, as it is when no individual is identified in the case of destruction of property.
laptops all day long.” Gustas works in the mailroom at Florida Southern and finds that the students have picked up on the new cloud based mail system faster than he has. Dawn Campagna. a Gen-Xer, is a payroll specialist that works with many people from younger generations. She also feels that they are able to understand new online systems better than she can. “I’m not able to catch on as fast as they are,” Campagna said. Despite the fact that some Baby Boomers and Gen Xers feel like they can not keep up with their younger counterparts, Pew Research found that the older generations are not as far behind as they percieve when it comes to smartphone and computer usage. According to Millennial Richard Arthurs, there are some downsides to being too dependent on technology in the workplace.
“An older-generation individual can count back change properly and not need a computer or calculator whereas the younger generation cannot, or is slowed down greatly trying to figure it out,” Arthurs said. Another aspect to consider when working with multiple generations is work ethic. Despite the fact that generational work ethic studies have found mixed evidence, workers find patterns among generational employee behavior. Gen Zer and Dunkin’ Donuts employee Chris Bradley noticed that when it comes to jobs in the food industry, the different generations’ work ethics and attitudes vary. “The younger generations just see it as quick money...whereas the older generations pay their bills, so they need to come to work,” Bradley said. Gustas says that they have to stay on top of some of the younger workers and others
do their jobs efficiently, but he attributes the differences to their upbringings. With all of the different generations in the workforce it is important to consider how each of them communicate. Arthurs, who manages many people of various ages, says that the older generations are better with communicating about time off while younger generations are not as timely and plan things the day before. Another thing to consider with communication is that terminology has changed, so it is important to be aware of that when talking with older or younger generations. “Everybody’s using new words and they say it differently, but that’s normal,” Gustas said. There are plenty of differences between the many generations, but understanding those differences is key to getting along with your coworkers and thriving in the workplace.
see SPIVEY, page 2
Five generations increases diversity in the workforce
Victoria Salvatore Staff Writer
As the retirement age is rising and a new generation of young people are beginning to look for jobs, the makeup of the workforce is rapidly changing. There are currently five different generations working side-by-side: The Silent Generation, Baby Boomers, Generation X, Generation Y also known as Millennials, and Generation Z. Every generation has different ways of communicating and varying areas of expertise. For example, many Baby Boomers and Gen Xers are not able to understand technology as easily as Millennials and Gen Zers. “They (Millennials and Gen Zers) prefer using anything electronic,” Baby Boomer Ron Gustas said. “You guys (Millennials and Gen Zers) like it more than (Baby Boomers) would because you guys use
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