Automation and artificial intelligence are reshaping the economy. That much is clear.
But many of the country鈥檚 top minds are sharply divided over just how disruptive technology鈥檚 impact will be, and just what kind of job market today鈥檚 students will eventually face.
To help K-12 educators and policymakers make sense of the debate, Education Week talked with leading experts in the fields of artificial intelligence, computer science, economics, education, and history.
We asked each a common question:
How can K-12 schools prepare for the uncertain future of work?
Here鈥檚 what they said:
Hadi Partovi | Founder, Code.org
Don鈥檛 get him wrong, says Partovi, whose organization is leading a massive push to bring computer-science education to every U.S. school. Understanding fractions will always be important.
But if schools want to prepare students for jobs that aren鈥檛 going to be automated, he says, they need to shift their emphasis away from rote practice, and towards conceptual understanding of both content and problem-solving processes.
鈥淚n the real world, we don鈥檛 calculate by hand any more,鈥� Partovi said. 鈥淲e should teach something like long division by teaching that it鈥檚 actually an algorithm, and then encouraging students to think about what they can use that algorithm for.鈥�
Paul Osterman | Economist, MIT
For a 2016 study, Osterman talked with manufacturing employers across the country. Overwhelmingly, they wanted workers with the ability to read an instructional manual, do community-college level algebra, and get along well with co-workers.
As a result, said Osterman, who used to run workforce-training programs for the state of Massachusetts, it鈥檚 misguided to think today鈥檚 students will be unemployable if they aren鈥檛 all advanced computer programmers.
鈥淔ocus on basic skills,鈥� he advised.
Ansley Erickson | History and Education Professor, Teacher鈥檚 College, Columbia University
When arguing the future of work will turn out fine, technologists and economists often point to education鈥檚 role in easing past upheavals in the U.S. economy. The switch from agriculture to industry, for example, was smoothed by the expansion of high school, the argument goes.
But Erickson says history鈥檚 lessons aren鈥檛 quite so neat. For one, she says, high schools at the turn of the 20th century weren鈥檛 really organized to teach kids the skills they needed for the factory floor鈥攆uture managers and secretaries actually benefitted most. And the new educational opportunities were also unequally distributed鈥擜frican-American sharecroppers, for example, often weren鈥檛 granted access to the industrial economy until its decline had already begun.
鈥淭his is a new version of an old question,鈥� Erickson said, 鈥渁nd the answer always leaves out some workers.鈥�
Michael Chui | Partner, McKinsey Global Institute
Chui says not to believe anyone claiming they can accurately predict what jobs will still be around, or what precise skills students will need, in 15 years.
Instead, he said, schools should focus on two likely realities: The world is going to be inundated with data. And as a result, most occupations will continually evolve in unpredictable ways.
鈥淜nowing how to ask provocative questions, use data to make decisions, and evaluate imperfect information will be increasingly valuable,鈥� he said. 鈥淎nd going forward, learning can鈥檛 be something you do only in the first couple decades of your life.鈥�
Stephen Wolfram | Computer scientist and founder, Wolfram Research
Increasingly, Wolfram says, we live in a world of networks and data and computing tools that give once-unthinkable powers to even young children.
As a result, he believes, the most valuable traits moving forward will involve the curiosity to ask big questions, the drive to understand those questions deeply, and the knowledge about how to translate ideas into code.
鈥淐omputational thinking is the new liberal arts,鈥� Wolfram said. 鈥淚t鈥檚 lovely when kids realize that they鈥檙e using general knowledge they鈥檝e learned elsewhere and turning it into something that can be said to a computer.鈥�
Laura Arnold | Associate commissioner, Kentucky Department of Education
In helping turn Kentucky into a national leader in career-and-technical education, Arnold has used data about local labor-market trends to guide decisions about what workforce-development programs schools should offer.
But it鈥檚 hard work: Employers tend to be focused on their immediate needs. 69传媒 have a hard time developing courses around medium-term opportunities, like robot maintenance. And the long term is just so uncertain.
鈥淲e don鈥檛 have reliable data on jobs 20 years out,鈥� Arnold said. 鈥淭he best we can do is create strong career pathways and hope they evolve.鈥�
James Paul Gee | Literacy studies professor, Arizona State University
From poverty to climate change to the rise of fake news, the world is in real danger, Gee believes.
But rather than trust students to use technology to address such challenges, he sees schools buying textbooks and focusing on preparation for jobs that soon may not exist.
鈥�69传媒 need to focus on developing morally good people who can deal with complexity and collaborate with others to make things better,鈥� Gee said. 鈥淭hat鈥檚 certainly better than saying, 鈥楲et鈥檚 prepare Johnny to program AI [artificial intelligence],鈥� when that AI will turn around and program Johnny right out of a job.鈥�
Tess Posner | Executive director, AI4All
Posner doesn鈥檛 foresee a robot apocalypse. But the former head of President Barack Obama鈥檚 TechHire initiative does believe artificial intelligence will reshape just about everyone鈥檚 daily life.
That鈥檚 why it鈥檚 so important that schools help expand the universe of people building, researching, and making policy around AI, she says. And her new nonprofit believes the best way to make that happen is by moving computer-science education beyond discussions of technology and programming techniques.
鈥淔ocus on applying artificial intelligence to human and social problems,鈥� Posner advised. 鈥淲hen you teach kids to program robots that mimic self-driving cars, ask what the impact could be for an aging population.鈥�
Osonde Osoba | Engineer and researcher, RAND Corp.
Artificial intelligence isn鈥檛 just changing work. It鈥檚 being used to automate important governmental and policy decisions, control the flow of information we receive, and reshape how we buy and consume products and services.
As a result, Osoba said, it鈥檚 more important than ever that schools not lose sight of a basic truth: Public education has always been about creating good citizens, not just training new workers.
鈥淎s AI is more widely deployed, students need the ability to think critically about how decisions are made,鈥� he said. 鈥淭hat means understanding statistics, mathematics, and algorithms.鈥�
Martin Ford | Author, Rise of the Robots
Ford sees three realities, all of which will likely appear bleak to educators.
69传媒 right now are preparing students for the jobs that are most vulnerable to automation, he says. Structural problems in the labor market mean that even if every kid could get a top-notch education, there still might not be enough jobs to go around. And no amount of investment in schools or job training will be enough to overcome the challenge, he believes.
鈥淎 big disruption is coming for society as a whole,鈥� Ford said. 鈥渁nd it may be that we can鈥檛 educate our way out of it.鈥�
