I have been teaching college students since the 1960s. Before that, I was one. From my vantage point inside university classrooms for the past 50-plus years, the changes have been dramatic.

To begin with, there are far more college students today. College students are as common today as high school students once were. According to the U.S. Census Bureau, 34 percent of the population 25 or older had a high school degree in 1950 and just 6 percent had a bachelor’s degree. In 2015, 36 percent had earned at least a bachelor’s degree.

The draft in the 1950s and '60s incentivized many young students to do well in school because they could get a deferment to attend college. In the late 1960s, students began to rebel against the war, as well as society in general. The census shows the largest percentage increases in high school and college graduations were in the 1960s and 1970s during the Vietnam War era.

The overwhelming size of the baby boom generation, which attended college from the 1960s through the mid-1980s, made it obvious there would be competition for the best jobs, so people saw the need to gain more skills. Many skilled-labor jobs left the country, and the number of computer-related jobs started to expand, creating a need for advanced education.

Before the 1960s, college students tended to be either rich or veterans studying under the GI Bill. Academic scholarships and grants were rare, leaving out most of the population.

Men once outnumbered women on college campuses, but that day is gone. In 1940, 5.5 percent of men and 3.8 percent of women were college graduates. By 1994, more than 20 percent of all women had college degrees, and in 2014 the percentage of women with a degree exceeded the male percentage. More women are now majoring in law, medicine and other fields formerly reserved for men.

Smoking a pipe in English class or bringing a dog to a lecture was once a good way for male students to attract one of the few women. Today, smoking is not even allowed on more than 1,700 campuses, and dogs must be kept outside on leashes.

Instructors were kings prior to the student revolts of the late 1960s. Before then, students didn’t dare question a professor’s argument or ask questions during what were very formal lectures. Today, questions are encouraged and there are even professors who want you to disagree with them — to a point.

Gradually, the most popular fields of study changed from liberal arts, agriculture and engineering to business and science. Humanities majors, as a share of all degrees, have dropped by nearly half since 1967. Since then, new occupation-oriented degrees — including those in medical science, computers, financial planning, public policy and criminal justice — have taken off.

Textbooks once cost $5 each, came in black and white with a minimum of graphics, and were updated every five or six years or less often depending on the subject. Today, the texts are updated yearly and sell for more than $100. They are multicolor and full of pictures and examples, but they remain mostly unread since the workbook supplement tells students all they need to know. As a contemporary told me, “They will buy the book. They just won’t read it.” Video, YouTube and whatever is on a cellphone are the learning modes of choice today.

Universities that have adapted to the cultural changes throughout the years have been the most successful in the competition for the best and brightest. Today, that means teaching students with short videos they can review on their phones and boosting science programs.

Tomorrow, it will mean something else, because on a college campus, change is constant.

Lee Schuh is a lecturer in the California Lutheran University School of Management.

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