Educating people to compete in today's world


Elphaba
 Share

Recommended Posts

The New Untouchables

“Our education failure is the largest contributing factor to the decline of the American worker’s global competitiveness, particularly at the middle and bottom ranges,” argued Martin, a former global executive with PepsiCo and Kraft Europe and now an international investor. “This loss of competitiveness has weakened the American worker’s production of wealth, precisely when technology brought global competition much closer to home. So over a decade, American workers have maintained their standard of living by borrowing and overconsuming vis-à-vis their real income. When the Great Recession wiped out all the credit and asset bubbles that made that overconsumption possible, it left too many American workers not only deeper in debt than ever, but out of a job and lacking the skills to compete globally.”

. . . .

That is the key to understanding our full education challenge today. Those who are waiting for this recession to end so someone can again hand them work could have a long wait. Those with the imagination to make themselves untouchables — to invent smarter ways to do old jobs, energy-saving ways to provide new services, new ways to attract old customers or new ways to combine existing technologies — will thrive. Therefore, we not only need a higher percentage of our kids graduating from high school and college — more education — but we need more of them with the right education.

I used to develop curriculum for Utah’s post-secondary technology training programs, and completely agree regarding the field of existing and emerging technologies.

People who are not trained/educated in these technologies will be left behind--there is no way around that. What is difficult, IMO, is that these technologies change so rapidly today it can be extremely difficult to keep up. I witnessed this during my tenure.

Unfortunately, there are hard-working, dedicated people out there who are just not innovative enough to discover “energy-saving ways to provide new services.” Or they might have previously been this innovative only to become obsolete by the next worker who brings a new energy-saving innovation to the company.

I realize competition is vital, and I’m not saying our workers should not compete--of course they should. I am just saying not all workers can compete in today’s technologies, for a myriad of reasons, and I worry for them.

One excellent solution is to continually partner with companies who use these technologies to develop training programs. On-going education is the only way workers are going to be able to keep their skills current, regardless of how it is delivered.

That's why I agree with Friedman's opinion that our education programs must teach our students the right skills to compete, including those in the field of technology.

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Has anyone developed a curriculum to teach common sense? Most overly educated people I have met have little of it.

Well lots of uneducated people have even less.

Until we have forever lasting tires and brakes there will be those jobs. Driving tractors and trucks too are jobs that need to be filled.

Guess everyone can't work in an office in the technology field.

Ben Raines

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Until we have forever lasting tires and brakes there will be those jobs. Driving tractors and trucks too are jobs that need to be filled.

This is true, but even in these sectors the technology is going to be ever-changing.

For example, the major tire manufacturers use robotics to make tires today, and they need employees who know how to use, reset and repair these robotics as needed in a timely fashion. Prospective employees who have these skills are going to be far more marketable than those who don't.

Another example is how complex automotive machinery is now. Today truck engines are essentiially computers with machinery attached to them, and mechanics need a larger skill set than they did ten, twenty and thirty years ago.

Heck, even I could have replaced a transmission thirty years ago!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Guest MrSatan
Hidden

Technology is a quantum only to be limited by time. Your time remaining, yet uncertain, is close as brimstone is to ember. Relish in your mere achievements of such materialistic things be you self righteous hypocrites. Your judgement you so long for shall arrive as promised but will pass like straw to a flame and you will learn what technology has proscribed for you.

Link to comment

Technology is a quantum only to be limited by time. Your time remaining, yet uncertain, is close as brimstone is to ember. Relish in your mere achievements of such materialistic things be you self righteous hypocrites. Your judgement you so long for shall arrive as promised but will pass like straw to a flame and you will learn what technology has proscribed for you.

Thanks, MrSatan!

Hey, I'm a Capricorn, too!

Link to comment
Share on other sites

Join the conversation

You can post now and register later. If you have an account, sign in now to post with your account.
Note: Your post will require moderator approval before it will be visible.

Guest
Reply to this topic...

×   Pasted as rich text.   Paste as plain text instead

  Only 75 emoji are allowed.

×   Your link has been automatically embedded.   Display as a link instead

×   Your previous content has been restored.   Clear editor

×   You cannot paste images directly. Upload or insert images from URL.

Loading...
 Share