As the par­ent of a child not too far off enter­ing high school, a num­ber of issues sur­round­ing her edu­ca­tion con­cern me. Not least of which is how are gov­ern­ments in Aus­tralia — Fed­eral and State — deal­ing with the increas­ing need for stu­dents of today to have an edu­ca­tion that is con­nected, col­lab­o­ra­tive and conversational.

It’s my view that schools are falling a long way behind the 8-​​ball in terms of pro­vid­ing our chil­dren with the type of edu­ca­tion they need these days:

  • con­nected — yes our schools are largely online, but use of online resources is lim­ited by com­puter avail­abil­ity, block­ing of legit­i­mate resources, lack of teacher train­ing in using online resources. It’s often the case that the kids are ahead of the teach­ers in their skill level at find­ing and exploit­ing online resources, or that sites that con­tain black­listed words are blocked in spite of legit­i­mate edu­ca­tional con­tent, or that resources in schools are so tight that kids get phys­i­cal access to a com­puter in class or the library only occasionally;
  • engag­ing — the class­room is still largely run on an Indus­trial Age model where our kids are taught to behave like fac­tory automa­tons, ready for a job on the pro­duc­tion line. It’s anti-​​creative and busy­work focused and not at all designed to equip our chil­dren for a world where bursty think­ing, cre­ative knowl­edge work is ever-​​increasingly the norm. Take a look at Sir Ken Robinson’s talk from TED 2006 if you’re not convinced:

  • dynamic, diverse and pas­sion­ate — lit­er­acy and numer­acy are unar­guably crit­i­cal com­po­nents in a well-​​rounded edu­ca­tion. But the tar­get shouldn’t be “func­tional lit­er­acy and numer­acy”, it should be deep exper­tise. As well, the notion of cre­ative and arts sub­jects as lesser to lit­er­acy and numer­acy is mad­ness. In all schools, the aim should be to pro­duce grad­u­at­ing stu­dents that are not only appro­pri­ately edu­cated in many sub­jects, but to do so in such a way as the stu­dents are invig­o­rated and excited by the things they are taught. We need to grad­u­ate more peo­ple like poly­math, Ben Dun­lap, of Wof­ford Col­lege. Ben’s talk at TED 2007 is truly incredible:

  • deliv­ered by the best pos­si­ble teach­ers — my daughter’s teach­ers have been largely very good, but it’s not enough. Teach­ers need to be dri­ven, pas­sion­ate, excep­tional. And they need to be paid for it. The best teach­ers with the best out­comes in their classes should be paid a wage and bonuses that reflect their excel­lence. By no means am I say­ing that teach­ers aren’t good enough. Mostly they are. But the sys­tem they work with doesn’t allow them to fly. Until only recently, Aus­tralian teach­ing unions were vehe­mently opposed to per­for­mance pay for teachers;
  • col­lab­o­ra­tive on as many lev­els as pos­si­ble — between stu­dents, between teach­ers and stu­dents, between class­rooms, between dif­fer­ent schools, between dif­fer­ent coun­tries. I espe­cially want to see more involve­ment from par­ents, par­tic­u­larly in areas of low socio-​​economic pro­file. The involve­ment and encour­age­ment offered by par­ents in the edu­ca­tion process is a key fac­tor in edu­ca­tional suc­cess or lack thereof (I am wit­ness­ing this first hand in my extended family);
  • tar­geted at pro­duc­ing grad­u­ates equipped for work in the 21st Cen­tury — in Aus­tralia there is a mas­sive skills short­age across many indus­tries. It’s arguable our schools, from pri­mary school to uni­ver­si­ties, are not ade­quately con­sid­er­ing the needs of busi­ness and soci­ety in prepar­ing grad­u­ates for work and worth­while, func­tional par­tic­i­pa­tion. Issues such as the shift to knowl­edge work in much of busi­ness, the need for cre­ativ­ity, the appar­ent schisms between worker gen­er­a­tions are all issues I feel are some­times inad­e­quately dealt with.

I’ve been think­ing about these issues for a while now, but was prompted to write about them by two events:

  • my friend, Bron­wen Clune, con­tact­ing me and sug­gest­ing that we cre­ate a move­ment in Aus­tralia to take action on these very issues from the point of view of con­nected, dig­i­tally empow­ered par­ents, and;
  • a visit, to hap­pen tomor­row, to my daughter’s school board (of which I am a mem­ber) by the State Oppo­si­tion Leader, Zed Seselja, so that he can put his party’s posi­tion on education.

My view is that there is just one crit­i­cal ques­tion we should be ask­ing our edu­ca­tors and the politi­cians respon­si­ble for edu­ca­tion pol­icy and programs:

What are you actu­ally doing — now, tomor­row, next year — that will ensure our chil­dren are equipped with the best con­nected tools, inspired and engaged by the diver­sity of their edu­ca­tion, taught by the best pos­si­ble teach­ers and equipped with all the right skills to enter soci­ety as a valu­able, con­tribut­ing col­lab­o­ra­tive mem­ber of the workforce?

I’m not inter­ested in pol­icy explo­ration, white papers, com­mit­tees and the like. I’m inter­ested in pos­i­tive, mea­sur­able action.