What Makes a Society Strong? Part One-Education

What occurs to me is that we have forgotten what creates muscles.  Exercise is the answer. Constant exercise.  How then do we create intellectual muscle?  Exercise?  We call it education.  In a recent article, I don't remember who wrote it, I read that 80 million members of our workforce have a high school education, out of 130 million workers.  The bulk of new jobs that will be available will require exercise.  Our current workforce is undertrained for the current market.  There are today more than three million jobs nationwide which are available, but there are not enough people with the needed skills to fill the jobs.

There is a need at the corporate level to recognize that internal growth will require upgrading their own workforces.  With continuing education.  Not just rewarding people for taking classes, but coordinating the corporate need with educators.  And educators need to upgrade their own skills.  Here's a problem that is easily solved.  Kids today know more about computers than their teachers, and the schools don't teach the skills that the market will need.  This speaks to the state education departments who fail in properly designing curriculum.  Why do colleges have so many "english majors"?  Maybe the entire education infrastructure needs a new look.

Education is important in and of itself.  An educated populace is engaged in the activities of life-family, community, the world.  Education is also important when applied to employment.  America has moved beyond the basic manufacturing economy of the past.  Manufacturing no longer is the business of the past.  Today it is complex, and more often than not it is sophisticated.  Learning to function in that environment requires education capable of matching that sophistication.

How we reach that level is another conversation.  It is clear, however, if we remain at the current levels of science and technology in comparison to the rest of the world, America will become a fallen empire.  We will go the way of Rome, the British Empire.  Yet, we as a country have continually said we are not a second rate nation, we can do better.

To do better, we need a longer time horizon, and a plan to reach a lofty goal-returning to the top.  This is not about teachers' unions, or charter schools, or Federal laws or state programs.  What it is about is demanding of all the participants-students, teachers, parents, government-that excellence is not a hope, but an expectation.  And knowing and understanding why it is important needs to be a part of curriculum design, political discussion, social programs, and community involvement.  Otherwise, we doom our children to second class citizenship, and our country to a status which our foreparents would not have found acceptable.

Thanks for stopping by.