Wednesday, September 29, 2010

Education and Economy

When you hear politicians speak, you'd think there was some direct connection between our economy and our education system. As if there were some pipeline connecting the kids test scores and our economy's GDP.

What nonsense.

If you're like me and you wince at the idea of blaming the kids for our economic times, or you do a double take when you hear our leaders speak of "catching up" or "remaining competitive" in our 21st Century Global blah-blah-blah, then I would like to recommend two pieces for you to read:

Blame the Kids by George Wood


4 comments:

  1. Thanks for the links. If we wanted to make a direct link to education and the economy, we would reduce our emphasis on early education and massively expand our adult education and retraining programs. Send everyone back to school for some portion of their week.

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  2. "you'd think there was some direct connection between our economy and our education system"

    Yeah... because there is.

    See: http://fora.tv/2009/06/29/James_Heckman_An_Economists_Perspective_on_Education or http://papers.ssrn.com/sol3/papers.cfm?abstract_id=960379

    Would you really argue that schools don't have any affect on the knowledge, discipline, and creativity required in the workplace?

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  3. I think my biggest problem with the education-economy connection is that somehow improving STANDARDIZED TEST SCORES will improve our economy. Now that just makes zero sense.

    Politicians should be more concerned with education as a means to improve society. People get so fixated on 'competition' and being 'competitive in the 21st century'--who cares? Competition implies winners and losers: education should focus on the development and growth of students, on finding practical solutions to problems faced by society, on creating engaged learners and citizens--not little worker bees to contribute to our economic honey pot.

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  4. I think that more now than ever that education is a critical foundation for the future of our economy. The economy as we've grow to know and love, is broken. Perpetual growth is not possible. Relentlessly consuming products has an end given the scare resources they are derived from. Who is going to invent the new economy that is truly sustainable? Who is going to solve some of the worlds most complex problems? Highly educated learners with a futurist stance. Time is running down on our current economy and we need a new perspective sooner than later. As always, the future is invented by creative, thoughtful, intelligent people - education has always play a key roll in "producing" such people.

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