On more than one occasion, I have been shocked to find that two people who I never expected to know one another actually did. I discovered that my friend from my dorm has known my friend from math class since orientation. A boy in my professional fraternity apparently sails with someone who lives right down the hall from me. A kid I went to high school with ended up being good friends with my next-door neighbor. Time and time again, I was shown how interlinked our campus community really is and how often we seem to overlook our connections.
With more than 30,000 undergraduates at the University of Michigan, it’s easy to feel like a small fish in a big pond. There are only so many friends you can make, organizations you can join or classes you can enroll in — naturally you’re not going to know everyone. But just because you don’t know every student passing you in the Diag or the names of everyone in your classes doesn’t mean that you are somehow disconnected or detached from the people around you. We are all more interconnected than we presume, something I feel is better recognized when considering the concept of degrees of separation.
I have long been fascinated by the six degrees of separation: The theory that any two people in the world can be connected through no more than six social connections. The idea that someone living around the globe and I are connected by less than six people is not only mind-blowing, but also demonstrates that the world is not as divided as some like to believe. This concept is only amplified in a campus environment. A recent study from Cornell University which researched course enrollments showed that any two students can be connected in three steps or less. This result doesn’t even take into account the connections that can be found through friends, extracurricular activities, living situations and parties.
To transfer this idea onto our own school, the University of Michigan has what I’d like to call “Michigan’s Two Degrees of Separation.” What I mean by this is that any two people at the University of Michigan are likely two or fewer social connections away from each other without even realizing it. Now, of course, this notion might seem far-fetched, but the harder you think the more it starts to make sense. The average U-M student takes about 15 credit hours per semester, which comes out to about four or five courses. That means that each of us is taking classes with hundreds of other students each week — students who also take classes with hundreds of other people. To add on to that, we have over 1,600 student-run organizations made up of students from all different years and backgrounds coming into contact with one another. Add all of that together with friend groups, dorm living and any of the other spontaneous ways college students meet on campus, and the result is a complex web of social interaction that connects the University of Michigan together.
To fully grasp how interconnected our community is we need to dig deeper than just the way the University is structured. We need to think critically about what unites all of us as U-M students. Sure, we all love football games and are eager to take a selfie with Santa Ono, but we, as Michigan Wolverines, have a distinct spirit that joins us together beyond the fact that we think it is great to be a Michigan Wolverine. Regardless of our backgrounds, in-state or out-of-state, STEM or humanities students, Greek life-enjoyers or Greek life-avoiders, what unites us and connects us is that desire we all have to be a part of this community, no matter what shape that may take.
That is what makes Michigan’s two degrees of separation what it is. Of course we can attribute our connectedness to the classes we take and the organizations we participate in, but it is ultimately our own attempts to participate in our college community that breathes life into this web of connection. Whatever your background or role at the University of Michigan, who your friends are or what you are trying to do here, all of us are compelled to be here and to grow here in some way. That is what makes us interconnected.
But why just stop at the University of Michigan? Any college whose students are passionate about cultivating an interconnected community should experience the degrees of separation phenomenon. Academic spaces, particularly universities, provide unparalleled opportunities for growth and discovery, and it is truly up to the students themselves to decide how connected they can be.
The bottom line is that even when you might feel like you’re totally separated or disconnected from the people around you, I promise that you are undoubtedly more connected to them than you realize. That person sitting next to you in lecture or the guy in front of you in the line for Joe’s Pizza might seem distant, but I promise if you take the time to think hard enough about it you’ll see how connected we all truly are.
Max Feldman is an Opinion Columnist who writes about the underappreciated and infrequently discussed aspects of University of Michigan culture. He can be reached at maxfeld@umich.edu.