Heather McGowan has published an intriguing new article examining the need for a focus on learning, rather than knowing, in order to prepare students for the 21st century. A portion of her article is excerpted below:
Students will have to be prepared to adapt and be more adept at critical thinking and problem-solving rather than just knowing information. In fact, that is exactly the point of a book written by Cathy N. Davidson titled Now You See It: How Technology and Brain Science Will Transform Schools and Business for the 21st Century. The main point Ms. Davidson makes is that 65% of the students in K-12 schools today will work in jobs that do not currently exist. A 2013 study by Oxford University predicts that 47% of today’s jobs will be automated in the next two decades. The Integrated Post-Secondary Education Data System (IPEDS), which tracks higher education data on retention and degree completion, focuses on the 150%, or 6-year, the marker for undergraduate (4-year) degree graduation rates. Ironically, Deloitte University Press recently projected that by 2020, 50% of the content in an undergraduate degree will be obsolete in 5 years. So, the process of becoming educated is now likely to be longer than the shelf life of the knowledge, training, and degree that’s gained.
What does this mean? It means that the idea of what constitutes education must change from knowing to learning. There is no longer a path towards a finished state where an individual has become “educated.” In a world of accelerated change, with rapid disruption cycles in industry and with rising automation, an individual must have learning agility – the ability to learn, adapt, and apply in quick cycles. It’s time to start thinking about the implications of this fact for schools.
How can we truly prepare students for this kind of adaptability and agility?
For more information, see Heather McGowan’s full article.
