Tech Directions - November 2007 - (Page 7)

lum, drew from surveys of employers and college officials to define workplace and college-ready skills. Michael Cohen, head of Achieve, helped clarify the inclusion of workplace with college-ready skills. Employers who were interviewed, he said, were those with high-salaried work requiring postsecondary education, primarily associate degrees. The Diploma Project standards, obviously, are not meant for students who transition immediately from high school into the workplace. sary for those at the bottom,” he added, but it is not advantageous for the country as a whole. While other panelists insisted globalization was affecting vocational skills, Mishel argued that economic policies and compensation were more basic issues. “How can the schools solve the problem of employers hiring someone with the same skills but willing to work for lower wages?” he asked. Carpenters, for example, are highly skilled workers who are underpaid in this country. Rather than inadequate skills, he has writ- ten in several articles, it is faulty domestic economic policy that creates stagnant wages, increased wage disparities, and offshored jobs. Wall Street Journal reporter David Wessel told the seminar that he chose to focus reporting on community colleges “because this is where the action is for the bulk of the American people.” Manufacturers, for example, have a skill shortage, and community colleges provide training for their needs, “but families don’t want their children to enroll in it because they think there is no What Other Skills? Several seminar panelists emphasized the importance of innovative thinking as a basic for global competitiveness. Andreas Schleicher, who heads up benchmark work for the Organisation for Economic Cooperation and Development, summarized new data on international student comparisons and what other countries are emphasizing. The skills demand, he said, is for less routine work and for more creative work. This requires “going beyond what it is easy to teach.” He also noted that some of the highest-performing countries do not use standardized testing. Darling Hammond added that in top-performing countries teaching is conceptual, not rote learning, and is very hands on. Susan Zelman, Ohio state superintendent of schools, is pegging her state’s reforms on global content comparisons, not on how her students compare with those in other states. In doing so, she said, the context is to produce “thinkers, young people with agile and flexible minds who are problem solvers.” A leading economist questioned the “crisis” in education and the rush to get all students into college. “To say everyone should go to college,” said Larry Mishel, head of the Economic Policy Institute, “does not look at an analysis of the skills needed.” American productivity led the world from 1973–1989, then dropped back but is now recovering, he noted. Also, 40 percent of the native-born workforce in this country already has an associate degree or higher. More education “is absolutely neces- www.techdirections.com WASHINGTON 7 http://www.techedcnc.com http://www.techedcnc.com http://www.techdirections.com

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Tech Directions - November 2007 Technically Speaking Contents Direct from Washington The News Report Technology’s Past Technology Today Mastering Computers Video Game Programmers Learn to “Pitch” Project Teaches Students to Diagnose an Ailing Windows OS See the Math with Your Binoculars! Fire Safety Technician ACTE Convention and Career Tech Expo Hands-On Activities More than Fun

Tech Directions - November 2007

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