knowledge work jobs of today and tomorrow that require complex
skills, expertise, and creativity. And many of the jobs of the
future do not even exist today!
If all these changes weren’t quite enough, students in school
today can expect to have more than eleven different jobs between
the ages of eighteen and forty-two.4
We don’t know yet how many
more job changes to expect after age forty-two, but with increasing
life expectancy, the number could easily double to twenty-two
or more total jobs in a lifetime!
What is certain is that two essential skill sets will remain at the
top of the list of job requirements for 21st century work:
IN MORE DEVELOPED COUNTRIES
IN LESS DEVELOPED COUNTRIES
Creative
Work
•Research
•Development
•Design
•Marketing and Sales
•Global Supply Chain
Management
Routine
Work
Routine
Work
DONE BY PEOPLE DONE BY MACHINES
Figure 1.4. The Future of 21st Century Work.
Source: Adapted from National Center on Education and the Economy, 2007.
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learning past and future | 11
• The ability to quickly acquire and apply new knowledge
• The know-how to apply essential 21st century skills—
problem solving, communication, teamwork, technology
use, innovation, and the rest—to each and every project,
the primary unit of 21st century work
To get a better sense of the rising importance learning and ed -
ucation are playing in our lives today, it’s useful to step back and
take a look at the roles education has played in the past, where
learning is heading, and the forces driving these changes.
Learning Through Time
Currently, nearly 1.5 billion children attend primary and secondary
schools in the world—around 77 percent of all school-age children.5
A billion and a half schoolchildren is a staggering number,
even though it leaves out another three hundred million and more
worldwide—most of them girls—who have no access to basic education.
Still, just imagine, as the sun rises across each time zone, all
those mothers and fathers waking up their children, making sure
they are washed and appropriately dressed, have (hopefully) eaten
some breakfast, and have gotten off to school on time—each and
every day of the school year!
But why is education so important that virtually every country
in the world has implemented some sort of formal education
system? Why has the United Nations declared it a fundamental
right of all children?6
And what do parents, teachers, businesses, social institutions,
governments, and society as a whole expect from education? Have
these expectations changed over time?
c01.indd 11 7/30/09 10:22 AM
12 | 21st century skills
The answers to these questions can help us understand what
the proper role and purpose of education ought to be in our own
times.
Education’s Purpose: Historical Roles and Goals
It has been observed that today’s education systems operate on an
agrarian calendar (summers off to allow students to work in the
fi elds), an industrial time clock (fi fty-minute classroom periods
marked by bells), and a list of curriculum subjects invented in the
Middle Ages (language, math, science, and the arts). It’s useful to
take a brief look at how this came about and what education’s role
has been in ages past, before turning to what education means for
us now and in the future.
What do a one-room school in a rural farming village, a
crowded classroom in a bustling industrial city, and a shiny new
school in a high-tech suburban zone have in common? What do
we expect them to do for our children? What have we expected
from our schools through time?
Education plays four universal roles on society’s evolving
stage. It empowers us to contribute to work and society, exercise
and develop our personal talents, fulfi ll our civic responsibilities,
and carry our traditions and values forward. These are the “great
expectations,” the big returns we want from our investments in
education. Or put another way, these are the four universal goals
we expect the education of our children to achieve.
These four pillars of education’s purpose remain constant
through time—much like psychologist Abraham Maslow’s universal
“hierarchy of needs,” which starts with physical needs and
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learning past and future | 13
moves up through safety and social needs, then respect and knowledge,
and culminates in self-realization and self-transcendence.7
But how people go about meeting these four universal needs in
different times and ages varies tremendously, as shown in Table 1.2.
In the Agrarian Age, when farming the land was the primary
work of society (as it still is in many parts of the world), contributing
to society meant learning how to grow food for more than
your family. Passing on the knowledge, traditions, and crafts of
rural life to your children was an essential survival need. Children
worked in the fi elds next to their parents and other family members,
and education beyond farming skills was not a high priority.
Civic responsibilities revolved around doing what you could to
help your neighbors and others in your village when they were in
need, as they would in turn help you when you were in need. The
social compact was simple and practical.
In the Industrial Age, when the population dramatically
shifted from farm to city and work moved from the fi elds to the
factories, education played new roles in society. Typically, men
had one or two career paths: working in a trade, factory, or clerical
job, or becoming a manager, administrator, or professional if they
could make the grade. Women’s choices were, of course, far fewer.
The real challenge for industry was to train as many factory and
trade workers as possible. So standardization, uniformity, and mass
production were important to both the factory and the classroom.
Those few destined for managerial or professional work were given
special learning opportunities to develop their potential.
Engineering and science skills, the new engines for industrial
growth, were particularly prized, along with the management and
fi nancial skills necessary to keep the industrial complex running
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14 | 21st century skills
Table 1.2. Society’s Educational Goals Throughout the Ages.
Goals for
Education Agrarian Age Industrial Age Knowledge Age
Contribute to Grow food for Serve society through Contribute to global
work and family and a specialized profession information and
society others knowledge work
Create tools Apply engineering and Innovate new services
and crafts for science to contribute to meet needs and
basic needs to industrial progress solve problems
Participate Contribute one piece of Participate in the
in the local a long chain of production global economy
cottage and distribution
economy
Exercise and Learn the basic Achieve basic literacy Enhance personal
develop 3Rs (reading, and numeracy (for development with
personal ’riting, and as many people as technology-powered
talents ’rithmetic), possible) knowledge and
if possible productivity tools
Learn farming Learn factory, trade, Take advantage of
and craft skills and industry job skills expanded global
(for most people) opportunities for
knowledge work and
entrepreneurship as
middle class grows
Use tools to Learn managerial and Use knowledge tools
create useful administrative skills, and technology to
artifacts engineering, and science continue learning and
(for a few at the top) developing talents
throughout life
Fulfi ll civic Help neighbors Participate in social and Participate in commuresponsibilities
civic organizations to nity decision making
benefi t the community and political activity
online and in person
Contribute to Participate in organized Engage globally in
local village labor and political issues through online
needs activities communities and social
networks
Support Contribute to local and Use communication
essential local regional civic improve- and social networking
services and ment through volunteer- tools to contribute
community ing and philanthropy time and resources to
celebrations both local and global
causes
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learning past and future | 15
smoothly. And with the great mixing of cultures in urban centers,
people became more aware (and eventually more tolerant) of traditions
different from their own.
Education’s Role in the 21st Century
This brings us to our own time, our recently arrived Knowledge
Age. In our newly fl at world of connected knowledge work, global
markets, tele-linked citizens, and blended cultural traditions,
the 21st century demands a fresh set of responses.8
(See Table
1.2.) In the Knowledge Age, brainpower replaces brawnpower,
and mechanical horsepower gives way to electronic hertzpower.
Table 1.2. Society’s Educational Goals Throughout the Ages, continued
Goals for
Education Agrarian Age Industrial Age Knowledge Age
Carry traditions Pass on farming Learn the past knowledge Quickly learn traditional
and values knowledge and of a trade, craft, or knowledge in a fi eld and
forward traditions to the profession and pass apply its principles
next generation this on to the next across other fi elds to
generation create new knowledge
and innovations
Raise children Maintain one’s own Build identity from and
in the ethnic, culture and values amid compassion for a wide
religious, and a diversity of traditions range of cultures and
cultural in urban life traditions
traditions of
parents and
ancestors
Connect with other cul- Participate in a wide
tures and geographies diversity of traditions
as communication and and multicultural
transportation expand experiences
Blend traditions and
global citizenship
into new traditions
and values to pass on
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16 | 21st century skills
Achieving education’s goals in our times is shaped by the increasingly
powerful technologies we have for communicating, collaborating,
and learning. And learning assumes a central role
throughout life.
Con