{"id":782,"date":"2016-08-08T20:55:36","date_gmt":"2016-08-08T20:55:36","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/?p=782"},"modified":"2016-08-08T21:05:52","modified_gmt":"2016-08-08T21:05:52","slug":"the-business-of-school-the-standardization-commercialization-and-commoditization-of-american-youth","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/2016\/08\/08\/the-business-of-school-the-standardization-commercialization-and-commoditization-of-american-youth\/","title":{"rendered":"The Business of School: The Standardization, Commercialization and Commoditization of American Youth"},"content":{"rendered":"

Whether we want to acknowledge it or not, we are going through one of the largest economic transformations that we have seen in well over 100 years. The world is shrinking in terms of connection, and no longer do we live in a time where the pursuit of prosperity involves understanding our local, regional and national marketplace conditions; the scope is much bigger now.<\/em><\/p>\n

Global marketplace conditions matter more now than ever.\u00a0The internet spawned the information age, which quickly\u00a0became the connection age (web 2.0), and for the first time\u00a0we witnessed the acceleration of commerce on a global scale.\u00a0Doing business in China is a Skype call away, and Switzerland\u00a0is a FaceTime connection away. It is not business as usual\u00a0as organizations of every size scramble to figure out how\u00a0they can leverage the new economy and its currency system.<\/p>\n

Trust, attention, purpose, story and relevance are all new currency\u00a0models that greatly aVect the bottom line. Some call it\u00a0“The Post-Industrial Economy.” Some call it “The Creative\u00a0Economy,” while others call it “The Connection Economy.”\u00a0Whatever you call it, it’s fundamentally diVerent from the\u00a0system we have served for well over a century. My concern\u00a0exists where it’s been falling for close to a decade now. Education.<\/p>\n

Standardization<\/strong><\/p>\n

The modern education system, as we know it, is rooted in\u00a0the standardization of young people. We hear it all the time:\u00a0Common Core and standardized testing. The tragedy of this\u00a0is that nothing is standard anymore. The emerging skillsforce\u00a0necessary in the new economy is replacing the workforce\u00a0supported by the standardized\u00a0learning, training and skill\u00a0acquisition models of today,\u00a0leaving graduates at every level\u00a0unprepared for a global marketplace\u00a0that requires an individual\u00a0to have well-developed skills\u00a0that can meet the demands of a\u00a0dynamic, innovation driven\u00a0marketplace. School, in large\u00a0part, is not teaching young people how to think. Instead, it is\u00a0doing an extraordinary job of getting them to memorize and\u00a0test in a time when information is not only abundant, it is at\u00a0our finngertips and changing rapidly.<\/p>\n

Commercialization<\/strong><\/p>\n

Right behind standardization is commercialization. By definition,\u00a0commercialization is simply the introduction of a new\u00a0product or service into the marketplace. However, when we\u00a0look at this process through the lens of how we are developing\u00a0young people to become contributors in one of the most
\nrobust marketplaces that we have ever seen, the global marketplace,\u00a0we are mirroring this concept of commercialization,\u00a0and it’s failing. We are taking our young people down an assembly\u00a0line that’s producing a product that does not fit in the\u00a0marketplace that it’s intended to impact. We celebrate hyper\u00a0consumption at epic levels, and yet we\u2019ve stripped away the\u00a0notion that we should be creating, making and innovating in\u00a0spite of having more access to resources and insight than ever\u00a0before. Our approach to developing young thinkers and leaders\u00a0is a loose methodology that’s producing great test takers,
\nand, likewise, followers.<\/p>\n

Commoditization<\/strong><\/p>\n

We race our young people down a uniform path of success\u00a0that’s becoming overwhelmingly ineffective. Research shows\u00a0us that 40 percent of the unemployment in the United States\u00a0belongs to college educated millennials. Over 2.8 million\u00a0young people will be graduating from college this year, and a
\nstaggering number of them will find themselves unemployed\u00a0or under-employed. In contrast, by 2020 the millennials will\u00a0represent an estimated 46 percent of all US workers, giving\u00a0this generation the win in both categories, unemployment\u00a0and employment, for the first time. They are also facing the\u00a0highest rate of student loan debt of any other generation before\u00a0them. Couple that with the idea that the millennials are\u00a0earning less compared to the nations median income, versus\u00a0people of the same age just a decade ago.<\/p>\n

Educate them more. Encourage them to rack up more debt.\u00a0Pay them less.<\/p>\n

We are losing a generation to the idea that the business of\u00a0school will rescue us. We are actively engaging an “economics first” model instead of a “citizens first” model. When we\u00a0stopped serving individuals, and the individuals started serving\u00a0the system, we drifted away from what school is supposed\u00a0to be doing \u2013 preparing young people for an uncertain, volatile\u00a0future, where creative and critical thinking, communication,\u00a0collaboration skills are of deep importance.<\/p>\n

There is hope. Innovation does not take sides. National scale\u00a0skills acquisition and development organizations like Make\u00a0School and Iron Yard are answering the call of a radical and\u00a0meaningful shift in how we “do” school. The work we do\u00a0at the year-round, science, technology, engineering, art and\u00a0math (STEAM) focused Creator\u2019s Camp, in Tallahassee,\u00a0Florida; Indianapolis, Indiana; and Valdosta, Georgia is just\u00a0one example of what happens when innovators and entrepreneurs\u00a0decide to get involved. These are signs that choice\u00a0is coming. Where there is choice there is change, and in the\u00a0midst of that change is a badly needed disruption of the status\u00a0quo.<\/p>\n

Vincent Hunt is an American\u00a0innovator, entrepreneur\u00a0and founder\/CEO of MASSIVE\u00a0Corporation USA,\u00a0Inc., a design consultancy\u00a0committed to helping young,\u00a0emerging creators prepare\u00a0for the future.<\/em><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Whether we want to acknowledge it or not, we are going through one of the largest economic transformations that we have seen in well over 100 years. The world is shrinking in terms of connection, and no longer do we live in a time where the pursuit of prosperity involves understanding our local, regional and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":783,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_cbd_carousel_blocks":"[]","footnotes":""},"categories":[2,38],"tags":[8,221,220,222,223,224],"class_list":["post-782","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-business","category-education","tag-business","tag-camp","tag-creators","tag-industrial","tag-school","tag-university"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/782","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=782"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/782\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":784,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/782\/revisions\/784"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/783"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=782"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=782"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/tallahasseefamilymagazine.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=782"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}