Our national political conversation is devoid of even mentioning the central issue that, within two decades, will most determine our nation’s fate: our most distinctive competency – our only long term competitive advantage – our collective intelligence.
I am all for STEM but I think we’d have a greater net number of STEMers if we focused our main efforts on getting more kids READY to learn their way into STEM.
How a president envisions the role of education in shaping the future of America is a telling indicator of his or her core beliefs, philosophies, economic theories, values, morals, and ethics.
What does it mean that most of our children are CHRONICALLY IMPROFICIENT in the skill areas most critically important for success in school?
The most cost-optimal, high ROI, way to improve our schools is to focus on upgrading the mental models through which educators understand and experience learning and understand their mission and purpose as educators.
The coming political argument about ‘Common Core Standards’ should force us to ask: “What is the mission of 21st century American education?” The mission of CCSS is to: Improve our economic future by teaching students the common core of knowledge and skills that WE KNOW THEY NEED TO LEARN. But how could we possibly think that WHAT WE THINK THEY NEED TO LEARN is more important to their futures than HOW WELL THEY CAN LEARN WHAT THEY NEED TO LEARN WHEN THEY GET THERE?
This is in response to David Roberts’ article: “Getting used to being in charge of the planet” David Roberts (DR): “the decisions made by people alive today will determine the fate of life on Earth for centuries to come” Yes. And, it’s always been true that what each generation profoundly affects the generations that follow. The … Read more
A company has developed software that can compete with human authors in writing news stories. Education Week (4-12-12) put out a similar story about a computer competing with college professors at scoring essays. Extreme Tech carried a story (Will an IBM computer be your next mayor?) about the use of IBM’s Watson to manage the operations of the city of Rio de Janeiro. Clearly the machines will extend into replacing humans everywhere it is cost-advantageous and socially acceptable to do so. In light of these changes, WHAT IS THE MISSION OF EDUCATION?
Re: Man vs. Computer: Who Wins the Essay-Scoring Challenge? From Education Week: Curriculum Matters 4-13-2012 “The results demonstrated that overall, automated essay scoring was capable of producing scores similar to human scores for extended-response writing items with equal performance for both source-based and traditional writing genre,” says the study. This is fascinating. Artificial intelligence has already … Read more
Re: Getting Our Kids Ready for the Competition – the Great Conversations and the 32,000,000 Missing Words! by Dick Jacobs Your piece creates a great framework for conversation but one point needs clarification: “Cognitive science tells us that if learning our reading fundamentals doesn’t start very early and the skills aren’t in place by age nine or ten, … Read more