Linking the Short Stories by Work Place

While I didn't spend much time writing over my four day week-end, I did spend time thinking about my latest possible short story collection which revolves around student activists as they turn 50.  I'm thinking about activists who would have been active in the 80's, not the 60's.  I had thought that the common link might be that they all went to the same undergraduate school.

But this week-end, I thought, what if they all end up working at the same school in their 50's?  That might make some sense--and explain how so many of them end up in academia.  Or maybe I should try to give them different careers. 

So far, I have 3 stories, and the protagonist of 2 of the stories is an administrator of some sort of academic department--am I writing the same character?  The 2 characters don't have the same past.  And one of them is more of a dean than a department chair, but a dean who is hearing student complaints--should I take some of that out?  Hmmm.  The protagonist of the 3rd is a cook.

I want the setting not to be a bucolic, liberal arts kind of college.  I thought about having the characters end up at a for-profit school--but I want one character to be a campus pastor--are there any for-profit schools that have a campus pastor?  Or maybe the pastor character will be a teacher or some sort of expert called in to help with some project?

I thought that I'd write all the stories and then figure out how to link them, but I wouldn't look forward to that sort of revision.   But so far, having them end up at the same school could work.

Now, of course, the real task still lies ahead:  the writing of the stories.  This used to feel easier.  I need to get back to that space.