June 8, 2023

As the cliché goes, “It’s not you, it’s me.” In this sense, education (you) is not what today’s students (me) need. What do I mean by this? It is time to talk about the challenges facing education today with regard to misalignment between what schools from 9-12 through higher education are teaching and what today’s students, and tomorrow’s adults, need. In one sense, I have to ask, are we being honest with our young people regarding education? Or, are we spinning a myth from the past that has lost its relevance? Worse yet, are we selling them a product in the form of higher education that has lost value? Are we having conversations with our students about multiple pathways to good-paying careers?  Hey education, we need to talk.

History and economics are the driving factors in our educational system. From the creation of public schools in the late 19th century to the adoption of and continued use of the Carnegie Credit Hour, to the increasingly common question “Is college worth it?”, few people are able to see through the marketing and rhetoric and come to any logical conclusion. Our current view of the educational pipeline is…