I received an invite from Parul university in Gujarat to do a live webinar on the topic ”21st century skills for students to succeed in work and life” and I immediately agreed even though I had little idea about it. I started delving deeper into the topic and was surprised to see tons of information. I quickly made some points and went on to do the webinar. Here's some of the data that I collated for reference and shared with the students and staff.
To begin with I started by setting the context and how changes have happened and we have evolved from stone age, to iron age to the middle ages and to -
Agrarian age in the 18th century - Farmers
Industrial age in the 19th century to – Factory system
Information age/computer/digital age in the 20th century – knowledge workers
Conceptual age in the 21st century – Creators and empathisers
Research data shows that for the first time in 1991, the spend on knowledge age tools exceeded the spend on the Industrial age tools by $5billion in the US alone. This was the investment in technology related work items including computers, printers etc. signifying the shift towards the new age. As the jobs were shifted, did the skill sets required to work in these jobs also shift and change?
Few years ago, 400 hiring executives were asked “Are students graduating from school really ready to work”? and their unanimous answer was “No” and the gaps as shared by them were:
Communication – Both oral and written
Critical thinking and problem solving
Professionalism and work ethics
Team work and collaboration
Working in diverse teams
Applying technology
Leadership and project management
The 21st century skill gaps are costing businesses a great deal of money. $200 billion a year is spent world over in hiring scarce talent and in training them to be work ready.
“Learning is earning”. Education has always played an important role. Any slight increase in the country’s literacy rate even by a small percentage has a huge positive economic impacts on the country. Education also increases earning potential. Every additional year of schooling can improve a person’s lifetime wages by 10% or more. Most government’s in the world have made primary education free and compulsory. Everyone has the right to education.
If education is given so much importance then where is the gap? Is our education system preparing students to solve tomorrow’s problems? Are the skills imparted even relevant?
We need to understand that the current education system is built on the industrial age model and focuses on IQ and in particular memorisation and standardisation. It was founded when industries needed workers with a relatively fixed set of skills and knowledge.
These skills today are replaced by artificial and augmented intelligence (AI). Anything that is routine and repetitive is getting automated. Only IQ alone is not sufficient. A good blend of IQ+EQ+RQ (Resilience) is required to unleash students potential.
In the current world, job creation is slowing down, job destruction is increasing, redundant roles are getting automated. As per the “Future of Jobs” report 2020 published by the world economic forum, its estimated that by 2025, 85 million jobs maybe displaced by a shift in the division of labour between humans and machines, while 97 million new roles may emerge that are more adapted to the new division of labour between humans, machines and algorithms.
“We are currently preparing students for jobs that don’t yet exist, using technologies that haven’t been invented, in order to solve problems we don’t even know are problems yet” – (source internet)
What skills are required today? We have quietly moved on to the “Conceptual age” where creators and empathizers are required. We have moved on from left brain thinking were logic was involved to Right brain thinking where creativity is required. Logic being taken over by AI.
Students today require job readiness, the ability to compete against smart machines. It’s the era of innovation, disruption and constant change where adoptability and learning flexibility are required. Students today require skills that are more relevant to the 21st century.
What are 21st century skill sets?
1. Creativity and innovation – We need people who can think differently and use imagination to generate new ideas to solve problems. We need risk takers to take risks, to fail, to be different, to come up with unique solutions.
Creativity is the ability to perceive the world in new ways, to find hidden patterns, to make connections between unrelated phenomenon and to generate new solutions.
Innovation is the process of turning a new concept into commercial success or widespread use.
Creativity is the ability to perceive the world in new ways, to find hidden patterns, to make connections between unrelated phenomenon and to generate new solutions.
Innovation is the process of turning a new concept into commercial success or widespread use.
2. Critical thinking and problem solving – Critical thinking skills includes observation, analysis, interpretation, reflection, evaluation, inference, problem solving, decision-making skills. The students should be able to think about the problem in a objective/critical way and process information to make better decisions and understand things better.
Critical thinking is the opposite of the regular everyday thinking which the mind does almost automatically. When you think critically, you deliberate and analyse and understand better and arrive at a better understanding/decision.
We need students to ask more open ended questions, question the basic assumptions, be aware of how the mind processes information, think for oneself.
3. Collaboration and Team work – Collaboration includes people working collaboratively to complete a project collectively whereas teamwork combines individual efforts of all team members to achieve a goal. Both involve working with a group of people to complete a shared goal.
Students should be encouraged to take part in group projects, team sports, doing things collectively as a team rather than as an individual so it helps understand each others better, connect with each other, communicate clearly and work towards the common goal.
4. Communication – Communication includes verbal communication in which you listen to a person and understand their meaning,
written communication in which you read their meaning and
Nonverbal communication in which you observe a person and infer meaning.
When communicating it is important to be clear, concise, correct, coherent, complete and courteous. Students require these skills to be able to speak and convey owns thoughts, ideas, and express with a wide variety of people.
5. Empathy and emotional intelligence - Empathy is the ability to communicate and lead by understanding others' thoughts, views, and feelings. It is a crucial skill which allows students to understand other peoples perspectives and integrate that to their own thinking and to connect and work with the world better as the entire world is merging into one single global community. Emotional intelligence helps them to understand better and express themselves better, find a purpose and lead more satisfying lives.
6. Adaptability and flexibility - Adaptability is more relevant today than any other time where the world is constantly going through changes every day. Students need to be able to adopt to changing circumstances, able to juggle multiple demands, adopt to new situations with fresh ideas.
When they are flexible they are able to deal with unexpected challenges quickly, calmly, efficiently.
7. Digital literacy -
a. Media literacy – Conventional media – TV, radio, newspaper and Digital media like the internet, email, social media
Media literacy is important so that students can be wiser consumers of media and responsible producers of own media
b. Information literacy – The ability to identify, apply, acknowledge and use the information available in a right way.
c. Technology literacy – The ability to adopt and use all the latest technologies available which could include smart phones, computers, emails, digital payments, ecommerce etc
Knowledge of this should enable the students to responsibly lead their digital lifestyles that we are all part of.
How can students acquire these skills? These skills cannot be learnt in isolation. Most of them overlap and all of them are essential. Students need to start taking up more collaborative projects, assignments, team work v/s individual work, take up team sports, participate in extra curricular activities, take up a hobby, pursue their passion which helps them prepare and get them job ready.
As students they can also take up internships to get an exposure to the real world problems while in school/college.
They can sign up for community work, volunteering, social work, social projects, contribute to the society etc. Some of the students hobbies, passion can be converted into business ideas and entrepreneurship promoted even while in school.
As staff and education providers, teachers should encourage enquiry based learning, ask more open ended questions, assign collaborative projects, allow for student led and student centric learning, give them projects which requires creative, original thinking, solving real world problems. Promote entrepreneurship by creating more opportunities for them to experiment and innovate. Allow them to take risks and fail early on.
The illiterate of the 21st century will not be those who cannot read and write, but those who cannot learn, unlearn and relearn – Alvin Toffler
Whether we have realised it or not, we have already moved on to the conceptual age and to just not thrive, even to survive in todays changing times, we need to move on to new skills sets that equip us to keep pace with the changing world!
