Professor’s 'Unexcused Absence Dance Challenge' Has Everyone Saying The Same Thing About This Generation Of College Students
The fear of being perceived as cringe is seriously hindering Gen Z's success in multiple areas of life.
Drazen Zigic | Shutterstock College can be pretty strict when it comes to attendance. Gone are the days of having your mom write you a note when you weren’t feeling your best, or just really wanted to avoid that math test. However, as conversations around things like mental health days become more prevalent, one professor decided to offer an "unexcused absence dance challenge" to give his students an opportunity to earn more days off.
Professor Matthew Pittman is an assistant professor at the University of Tennessee, Knoxville’s School of Advertising and Public Relations. In honor of the new school year that just began, he gave his students a pretty enticing offer — they could go from two days of unexcused absences in his class to 15. The only catch was that they had to dance for it.
The professor encouraged his students to dance to increase their allowed number of absences.
In a video with 4.3 million views, Pittman stood at a lectern while speaking to one of his classes. “If you read the syllabus, you know you are allowed two unexcused absences in this class, but I’ll bump that number up to 15 if you can dance for 15 seconds right now,” he said. “Who would like to dance?”
It looked like every single student’s hand went in the air. But then, Pittman shared that he had some rules about those 15 seconds of dancing. “Uh, the catch is that it’s a song from the year you were born that you’ve never heard before,” he added. Nearly everyone’s hands went down, leaving Pittman with just three takers.
The first, a young man, jumped around and body rolled for 15 seconds before walking back to his seat. The class was almost entirely silent, with maybe one or two people weakly applauding. Next up came a young woman who appeared to follow some kind of contemporary, interpretive choreography. She was followed by a girl who energetically bounced around.
Everyone is saying Gen Z is too afraid to be judged as cringe.
Perhaps the greatest tragedy of all was that these young whipper snappers were clearly not educated in the art of music. None of them knew the songs from the year they were born, which were each iconic bops: “Since U Been Gone” by Kelly Clarkson, “Hey There Delilah” by The Plain White T’s, and “Toxic” by Britney Spears.
Regardless of their musical knowledge, or lack thereof, the fact that only three students out of a full college class volunteered to momentarily embarrass themselves for 15 unexcused absences is pretty shocking. 15 seconds surely feels like a long time when you’re dancing in front of your new class, but it really goes by in a blink.
Still, these students did not want to be judged and seen as “cringe” by their classmates. This isn’t just holding Gen Z back from getting more unexcused absences. According to Forbes contributor Ruth Oh Reitmeier, “Workplaces reward visibility, risk-taking, and speaking up. But Gen Z has been conditioned to avoid the appearance of effort and potential failure in front of others.”
Gen Zers are also the ones doing the judging, though.
You would think that a generation so afraid of being perceived a certain way would give others some grace when it comes to feeling like they did something cringeworthy, but the opposite is actually true. As one commenter said, “They all got the Gen Z stare instead of applause.”
Polina Tankilevitch | Pexels
Psychology professor Tara Well, PhD, described the Gen Z stare: “Unlike previous generations who often aimed to appear friendly, like they were having a good time, many Gen Zers seem to be adopting a flat, emotionally neutral look.”
These students may not have purposefully been trying to look like they were judging their classmates, but by not reacting in any way, that’s definitely the vibe they gave off. Gen Zers need to be careful not to put even more stress on each other by appearing judgmental and cold. Everyone is just doing their best, whether they’re dancing or not.
Mary-Faith Martinez is a writer with a bachelor’s degree in English and Journalism who covers news, psychology, lifestyle, and human interest topics.
