Mindset Lists began as a simple way to help professors at Beloit College better relate to their students. Now, on a larger scale, the lists have proven to be a mesmerizing way to retell American history. College officials Tom McBride and Ron Nief developed the first Mindset List in 1998. It offered scores of one-liners describing events that happened before the incoming freshmen were born, reminding professors that references to those events could draw blank stares.
Office of Strategic Communication