Dive Brief:
- Millennials face a far different and more fractured work environment than previous generations, with the current generation likely to have worked for 10 to 15 employers by the time they are 40 years old. Current and future employees will have to develop skills typically associate with entrepreneurs.
- Sajan George, the founder and CEO of Matchbook Learning, writes in EdSurge that students in K-12 education will also have to develop new skills and reflect on how the choices they make in learning will inform their passions, as it will lead them to inspiring motivation and desire to learn.
- George stressed that competency-based learning, which many view as an "input" method of instruction based on developing a students’ mastery of a subject or skill, could also be viewed as an "output," with students illustrating demonstrated proficiency. George argues that a successful competency-based learner has similar attributes to what would make a successful millennial employee.
Dive Insight:
We are in the midst of a transition of how higher ed institutions market themselves to a student population that is increasingly non-traditional and increasingly willing to consider alternative approaches beyond the conventional four-year campus model, and administrators of prominent universities should be thinking ahead for the time when a stature and reputation will stop drawing any applicants. It is also possible that more employers are moving towards George’s theory that a four-year model is outdated; Google, among other prominent companies, does not require students attain a college degree as a prerequisite for employment (although Google is not necessarily trustful of alternative credential programs or bootcamps).
This will likely take time to filter from the workplace to K-12 education, but administrators and counselors working with students considering their path after high school should be wary of falling into the stigma that some students feel about career and technical education, that it is only for students who are "not a good fit" for a conventional college education. As the "typical" work life continues to transition, the concept of a conventional college education may be undergoing a similar transformation.