Is Higher Education Still Worth It?
Today, we often hear about high prices charged by universities and colleges while, at the same time, graduate unemployment and underemployment has increased with the sluggish economy. Students may be saddled with sizeable loan debts in order to complete a degree. We have recently seen students very visibly complaining about this situation in the “Occupy” […]
Who Should Equip Learners for the Job Market?
Globally, study after study is coming up with one message: graduates lack essential skills to get by in the workplace. They lack skills like communication, teamwork, critical thinking, the ability to work under pressure, and even punctuality! In a global survey of business leaders by Hult International Business School (2013), one of the key insights was that leaders […]
Make College Worth It
I am the youngest of seven children from an agricultural province in China, and the only one to have made it to college. The late 1980s in China was a time of transitions, when the government started to let students fund themselves through college, as compared to the previous decade when tuition was minimal. Our […]
Creative Public Leadership
How School System Leaders Can Create the Conditions for System-wide Innovation This article is the executive summary of the 2015 WISE Research Report “Creative Public Leadership“. Find out more about the 2015 WISE Research series. This interim report explores how school systems can create the conditions for successful innovation that transform outcomes for all learners. The focus […]
Redesigning the Goals of a 21st Century Education
Many have addressed how present and future students should learn. Few have examined what students should learn for the 21st century. The rapid increase in the rate of systemic change around the globe creates an increasingly volatile, uncertain, complex, ambiguous world and thus is significantly more unpredictable. Six emerging trends will require a diverse set of individual abilities and […]
The World Needs a New Curriculum
“Decide in your heart of hearts what really excites and challenges you… Don’t let life randomly kick you into the adult you don’t want to become.” ― Chris Hadfield, astronaut What will it take for the world to stop offering our children an education that is only a slightly updated version of what was offered in the 19th century, and […]
Teacher Policies
Global Best Practices for Developing the Teaching Profession This article is the executive summary of the 2015 WISE Research Report “Teacher Policies“. Find out more about the 2015 WISE Research series. Teacher polices are key to improving teacher quality which impacts student outcomes. Many educational systems grapple with the issues of recruitment, teacher preparation, performance management, teacher […]
K-12 Reform in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Countries
Challenges and Policy Recommendations This article is the executive summary of the 2015 WISE Research Report “K-12 Reform in the Gulf Cooperation Council (GCC) Countries“. Find out more about the 2015 WISE Research series. In an age of global connectivity in which knowledge and information are the currencies of individual success, education is among the best investments […]
Can Venture Capital Unlock Innovation in Education?
Tech investors and entrepreneurs will often tout venture capital as a vehicle to enable innovation in education. But that’s not what venture capital does, although innovation might at times be one of the side-effects. Venture capital is investment, and a particular kind of investment in a particular kind of startup at that. Venture capital is […]
Business for Education is Education for Business
Professor Tom Fletcher will be speaking at the 2015 WISE Summit. In the last month, 200,000 Syrian refugee children have had the chance to return to school in Lebanon — some of them for the first time in more than four years. This was a talismanic example of what the public and private sector can achieve […]