Whose Job Is Education?
I thought I was a fan of businesses telling schools what skills they need, but this puts it in a different light for me.
“CTE [Continuing and Technical Education] classes [are] changing from an emphasis on encouraging students to pursue their interests in work-related skills and knowledge to courses that partner with specific corporations and businesses to form “career pathways” that lock students into narrower courses of study as early as seventh grade.”
I didn’t know what I wanted to do in 7th grade – or even 10th grade… or most of college (or for quite some time after that)! Are we putting kids in a box before we know anything about them (and before they even know themselves)?
What role do you have in shaping your future employees? Do you offer apprenticeships? Do you offer internships (for money and/or for college credit)?
Are you sure you know what skills those future workers will need by the time they get to you? Technology and business processes are changing at ever-quickening speeds.
What if we focused on broader skills like independent learning, creativity, and problem solving?
Can you perhaps teach the skills you need to your workers once they’ve been hired?