Preparing Students for an Unimaginable Future: Trends, Benefits, and Challenges
In a rapidly changing world, preparing students for the future requires understanding long-term trends in work, children's abilities, and teacher quality. Education brings non-economic benefits like improved health and societal contributions, emphasizing the need for raising achievement. Changes in workplace skills and salary highlight the importance of education levels. Automation and off-shoring impact job sectors differently. Understanding these dynamics is crucial for shaping education policies that align with the demands of an evolving world.
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How do we prepare students for a world we cannot imagine? Dylan Wiliam
Three long-term trends 2 Changes in: The world of work The abilities of children The quality of teachers How we should respond ?
Non-economic benefits of education 3 More educated students live longer are healthier have less disability towards the end of their lives are less likely to be teenage parents are less likely to be incarcerated are less likely to commit suicide Centre for Research on the Wider Benefits of Education (www.learningbenefits.net) ?
Raising achievement matters for society too 4 Increased economic growth: Net present value to the U.S. of a 25-point increase on PISA: $40 trillion (U.S. national debt: $13 trillion) Net present value to the U.S. of getting all students to 400 on PISA: $70 trillion ?
Changes in skills needed in the workplace Skill category Percentage change 1969- 1999 +14% Complex communication Expert thinking/problem solving +8% Routine manual Non-routine manual 3% 5% Routine cognitive 8% Autor, Levy & Murnane (2003) ?
Real-terms changes in salary: 1978 to 2005 Education level Change in salary Postgraduate qualification +28% BA/BSc Some college +19% 0% High school diploma 0% High school dropout -16% Economic Policy Institute (2010) ?
Off-shoring and automation 7 Off-shoreable Not off-shoreable Radiographer Security analyst Tax accountant Surgeon (?) Bricklayer Hairdresser Skilled Food packager Data entry clerk Call centre operator Grocery store clerk Receptionist Retail salesperson Unskilled ?
How flat is the world? Percentage crossing national boundaries: 1. 1% 2. 5% 3. 10% 4. 20% 5. 50% A. Physical mail: B. Telephone minutes: C. Internet traffic: D. First generation immigrants: E. University students: F. People, ever in their lives G. Goods and services:
Mostly round; some flat bits (Ghemawat, 2011) Percentage crossing national boundaries Physical mail: 1 2 Telephone minutes: Internet traffic: 17 First generation immigrants: 3 2 University students: People, ever in their lives: 10 10 Goods and services: ?
There is only one 21st century skill 10 So the model that says learn while you re at school, while you re young, the skills that you will apply during your lifetime is no longer tenable. The skills that you can learn when you re at school will not be applicable. They will be obsolete by the time you get into the workplace and need them, except for one skill. The one really competitive skill is the skill of being able to learn. It is the skill of being able not to give the right answer to questions about what you were taught in school, but to make the right response to situations that are outside the scope of what you were taught in school. We need to produce people who know how to act when they re faced with situations for which they were not specifically prepared. (Papert, 1998) ?
In place of achievement gaps 11 An alternative aspiration: All students proficient Many students excellent All sub-groups of students properly represented in the excellent ?
Massive gains in US IQ over time WISC subtest IQ gains from 1947 to 2001 (Percentile ranks) Information 6 Arithmetic 6 Vocabulary 12 Comprehension 27 Picture completion 28 Block design 36 Object assembly 38 Coding 38 Picture arrangement 42 Similarities 44 Flynn (2007) ?
What kinds of schools do we need? School model Ethos Key process Talent refineries School must provide opportunities for students to show what they can do Ensuring good teaching and syllabus coverage Talent incubators All students students can learn, but not all students can achieve at high levels Drawing out what is within the student Talent factories All students can achieve at high levels Whatever it takes ?
Wheres the solution? 14 School organization School structure Curriculum reform Technology Workforce reforms ?
We need to focus on classrooms, not schools 15 In the USA, variability at the classroom level is at least four times that at school level. As long as you go to school, it doesn t matter very much which school you go to. But it matters very much which classrooms you are in. It s not class size. It s not the between-class grouping strategy. It s not the within-class grouping strategy. ?
And most of all on teachers 16 Take a group of 50 teachers: Students taught by the most effective teacher in that group of 50 teachers learn in six months what those taught by the average teacher learn in a year. Students taught by the least effective teacher in that group of 50 teachers will take two years to achieve the same learning (Hanushek & Rivkin, 2006) And furthermore: In the classrooms of the most effective teachers, students from disadvantaged backgrounds learn at the same rate as those from advantaged backgrounds (Hamre & Pianta, 2005).
The value of teachers 17 According to Chetty et al. (2011) being taught by a good teacher for just one year increases lifetime earnings by $50,000 (NPV: $9,000) A good teacher contributes around $450,000 to the US economy every single year (Hanushek, 2011) ?
Long-term trends in the abilities of teachers 18 White male professionals White male teachers Female professionals Female teachers 90% Proportion with IQ over 113 80% 70% 60% 50% 40% 30% 20% 10% 0% 1941-45 1946-49 1951-53 1957-59 1960-62 1963-64 Bacolod (2007) ?
Replace existing teachers with better ones? 19 De-select (i.e., fire) ineffective teachers? Replace least effective 10% with average teachers 2 points on PISA (right away, if it can be done) Raising the bar for entry into the profession? Require teachers to have masters degrees 0 points on PISA (ever) Exclude the lowest performing 30% from getting in 5 points on PISA (in 30 years time) So we have to help the teachers we have improve The love the one you re with strategy ?
How do we speed up teacher improvement? 20 Merit pay for effective teachers? Can t be done fairly, and doesn t work Create a culture of continuous improvement Responsibilities of teachers To continue to improve classroom skill for the whole career To focus the improvement on ideas supported by evidence Responsibilities of leaders Create the expectation for continuous improvement Keep the focus on what is likely to improve achievement Provide support Encourage risk taking ?
And what does the research show we need to do? 21 Extra months of learning per year Cost/classroom/ year Intervention Class-size reduction (by 30%) 4 $30k Increase teacher content knowledge from weak to strong. 2 ? Formative assessment/ Assessment for learning 8 $3k ?
Approaches to formative assessment 22 Improve team-work and systems Professional learning communities Regular meetings focused on data 16 points on PISA (in two to three years) Improve classroom practice Teacher learning communities Investing in high-quality PD for teachers 30 points on PISA (in two to three years) ?
