Tuesday Times Roundtable

Participating in the Tuesdays’ roundtables was one of the most enjoyable activities of the Global Learning program. Due to my class schedules I was not able to attend these roundtables until the fall semester of 2017 and into the spring semester of 2018 I will definitely encourage students to join these sessions. The issues discussed during these luncheons are as diverse as our own world. There is so much that I learned and that I was able to share later on with family and friends.

The Tuesday Times Roundtables are FIU’s weekly series of moderated conversations on The New York Times articles. During these roundtables; which include lunch, there is the opportunity to discuss different viewpoints from the perspective of students, faculty, and staff. It is the ideal setting to bring an issue or situation to the table and to be able to confront all different angles. Every time I left the room after one of these discussions, I found myself with knowledge of a new issue, or more information about an issue I was aware of previously, or even a new angle of the issue that I had not explored before. These roundtables are incredibly informative and also a great opportunity to meet other students.

But going back to new information and knowledge, I would like to say that there was a roundtable that took place in January of 2018 – “If We Are More Connected Than Ever, Why Are We Not Happier?” – presented by Ms. Sonia Hernandez, Account Manager for the Career and Talent Development at FIU. The presentation was based on the issue of today’s world of social media; and some of the key points of this discussion revolved around how individuals between the ages of 18 and 34 feel depressed and lonely in comparison with individuals over the age of 55, for example.

I learned that the first group, 18-34, also admits to being concerned with issues of loneliness, being single and the quality of their relationships with family and friends. All these individuals are so obsessed with social media that they fall in a trap of constantly having to present themselves in an “edited” version. In other words, these people avoid their real selves; and I learned that this falls under the category of what is called a “status-update culture”.

This discussion in particular made me reflect on what is happening to my own generation in regard to who we are as social and emotional beings. How could this behavior affect this generation in the long run? How will this affect the cultural development of this generation? How can we assess the real impact of social media in our lives? One thing is clear, we all know how to talk on the phone, how to text, how to send emails, tweets and use Instagram and Facebook; but, what about communicating at a human level? We have many ways to say things but we are communicating less and less every day; and we are losing the human contact and that is why there is depression and loneliness.