It’s difficult to know what to make of the turmoil on college campuses these days — the protests, polarization, intimidation and general bitterness. In a revealing article in The Wall Street Journal, higher education reporter Douglas Belkin sets these events against a broader backdrop: the disappearance of a sense of community. He points to research demonstrating that “College students today are lonelier, less resilient and more disengaged than their predecessors … The university communities they populate are socially fragmented, diminished and less vibrant.”
One wonders whether this loss of community has led to more distrust, sharper disagreements and more anger. People are encountering one another at these protests often for the first time, often as strangers.
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