We Need to Disrupt Education, Now

Why?

States are broke. Municipalities are broke.  We’re reducing the number of teachers and reducing the investment in education.  Does anyone really think this is a recipe for success?

If we want to be competitive in the global economy, we need to make some serious changes. Now. 

Our country has fallen behind in key areas of education.  America needs to be the leader in education, in innovation, in manufacturing and in technology. There are over 7 billion people in the world and only 314 million Americans.  To lead, we need everyone to be educated and equipped with the skills of the future.

Shockingly, our education system has not changed in two hundred years.  We still require every student to learn the same way, at the same time, in the same classrooms, with the same lectures, using outdated and one-dimensional learning materials.  We are more focused on historical subjects versus preparing our best and brightest for the skills they need to excel in a future of innovation and flux.

Everyone agrees it’s broken, so why are we waiting?  If we wait for government, entrenched institutions or the companies that have made a fortune protecting the past, we will lose another generation of students.

We can make education more accessible, more affordable and more relevant using technology.  If we embrace what is and what needs to be done, rather than what was, we can move forward.

There are approximately 3.6 million open jobs in America, but there’s a skill gap forming between what’s being taught and what employers require to fill a position.  My company, Chegg, the student hub, studied 3 regions in April of this year and compared open jobs in the area this year with recent graduate majors.  The results were revealing and troubling. 

Fifty-four percent of jobs in San Jose, California fall within the area of IT, but only 2 percent of students in the area are graduating with IT degrees.  Thirty-nine percent of the jobs in Columbus, Ohio also fall within the area of IT, but only 2 percent of students are graduating with IT degrees.  And, in Miami, Florida, 36 percent of the open jobs are in the accounting/finance field and just 4 percent of students in the area are graduating with accounting/finance degrees.

In addition to graduating without the skills for the future, students and their families are accumulating a staggering amount of debt, which has grown to over one trillion dollars in the U.S.  Today, students spend dozens of hours a week just on their academics.  And many of those students have multiple jobs to offset rising costs.  The concept of attending a class at a specific time or meeting with a professor at random and inconvenient office hours can no longer be the norm.

This generation is growing up with an entirely different view of how, who with, where and even, what time of day they should learn and interact.  Students today have never known a day without technology, the Internet, mobile phones, Skype, Google or Facebook.  As a result, they don't understand or value the historical bias that everyone needs to learn the same information, on the same day, the exact same way.

We need to shift our focus to the students versus the administration and those who’ve sold billions of dollars worth of product to institutions.

It’s time to re-conceptualize education.  We need to allow students to learn how they want, when they want and where they want - whether it’s in the classroom, via text, through video, in study groups with their class, in study groups at their school or even online with students around the world. Technology allows us to focus directly on the needs of today’s students, eliminating the historical boundaries of time, location, tools, scale and even cost.

Many schools are working to embrace the change; testing emerging new tools to help students master challenging subject matter.  Students are helping drive the change using new types of learning tools and materials from new sources - some of which don’t even come from their own institutions.  Perhaps, for the first time in our history, students are more experienced and skilled at the most powerful learning tool of our lifetime (technology and the Internet) then those who are charged with teaching them. This is causing an uncomfortable situation between students and educators and should cause us to accelerate teacher training to help educators adapt, learn, and test new types of learning tools.
The ultimate goal is for the student to master subjects and expand their minds, but it is as just as critical that they can access and learn the job skills of the future.

The time is now to fix our failing education system. This is not a Democrat or Republican issue, this is an American and economic issue.

And no one idea will solve this problem, so we want to hear from you.

For those of you who have a genuine interest in fixing our education system, especially higher education, please share your ideas about innovative technologies, schools and strategies so – together – we can collaborate and help our students and our country succeed.

Prema Edwina Bedell

Retired Senior Research Scientist, Indian Council of Forest Research and Education, Dehradun' Uttarkhand, India.

7y

I agree with the points brought out here. But I have yet another point which needs to be considered. It is a point that affects the attitude of the students. All science subjects are taught without any links as to why they should be studying so many subjects. When I did research for my book 'The Great Eternal Truths ' I had to link up seemingly unconnected pieces of research from physics, chemistry , biology, astronomy, mathematics, geology, geography, genetics, cell biology, microbiology, oceanography,etc to arrive at the truth about the nature of the earth we live on. It is only when we get the perceptions about the different phenomena and situations about the life around us can we make uninterrupted progress.

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Liam Clancy

Specialist in business & community development

8y

So three years later---- Are we there yet?

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Ketina Chikwanda PMP/MBA/PrEng/LifeCoach

Professional Engineer @ Municipal Infrastructure Support Agent | PMP

11y

Almost every country isn’t happy with the quality of their education system so it’s not just an American problem. A holistic solution is required though. Is there something extremely wrong with the education systems or it’s just a perception? Are we asking the right questions? Shouldn’t special emphasis be placed on primary education? Should education be tailored for the professions of the times or should it transcend the times? At what point in their education should students choose their field of study? Imagine an IT engineer who has no appreciation of history/geography/accounts/biology? Shouldn’t education be there to teach us to think, analyse and solve problems thereby giving us foundation to tackle life's problems- be it in IT, engineering or accounts? As Angshuman R., education should be a survival tool, we need to produce intelligent graduates, who can survive, learn new things etc. Should we change the education system to support the in-thing, e.g. IT? Electronic systems should be used as a support tool in primary education, not to tailor learning around electronic systems. Imagine a CEO who can’t write a speech without a computer because she started using spelling and grammar check software in first grade. Schools should be left to provide the universal background, to teach students to survive in whatever environment. There arent many IT graduates because the basic primary education is no longer taken seriously. Students do not devote time to learning “difficult” subjects like maths and science; they do not want to learn at all. This is a social problem, not a problem with the education system. At tertiary level, employers need to be more involved by collaborating with universities and colleges to ensure that the university curriculum is tailored for the market. Employers should be willing to invest in training and developing talent to suit their specialist needs not asking graduates to specialise- people need to remain employable and restricting themselves to your special business needs will not benefit them. Most of the people commenting on this thread were in school before IT was even “invented”, does that make you less productive, or is your good educational background allowing you to adapt to whatever technological requirements?

"Perhaps, for the first time in our history, students are more experienced and skilled at the most powerful learning tool of our lifetime (technology and the Internet) then those who are charged with teaching them" Good point.

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Paul Fioravanti, MBA, MPA, CTP

CEO | Interim CEO | Board Member | Director | Fixer | Advisor | Connector | Operating Partner I Growth, Change, Transformation, Performance and Profit Driver

11y

Garbage in, garbage out. I always wondered what made guidance counselors qualified to give career advice on other professions. Reminds me of the lunacy of priests giving marriage classes. The only thing more bizarre is the politically connected person without a college degree who sits on the school board or the popular coach who was a C- student made a principal.

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