Feel old?

(Beloit, Wis.-AP, August 27, 2004) — They likely did their college searching mostly online and knew from childhood that computers suffer from viruses.

For incoming college freshmen this fall, one-hour photo processing has always been a reality, Cleveland's Rock 'n Roll Hall of Fame has always existed and there's always been a cable comedy channel.

Those are some of the findings in Beloit College's latest Mindset List designed to help faculty and staff relate to the latest crop of students - most of whom are about 17 years old and were born in 1986.

Classics Professor Art Robson, who regularly teaches in a First-Year Initiatives program for entering students, edited the list.

He noted that most of the new students were born in the year that the Chernobyl nuclear power plant melted down and the Challenger space shuttle exploded after takeoff.

It was also the time when Clint Eastwood was elected mayor of Carmel, Calif., the Soviets were bogged down for a seventh year of frustration trying to control Afghanistan and the United States was preoccupied with the Iran-Contra scandal.