The End of Schools!

The futurist Da Vinci Institute has been working on a detailed report on the future of education for the past 18 months, using several thousand man hours, expert interviews, and various intensive techniques.

“We have identified 12 critical dimensions of the future learning system. However, only the first two need to be in place for the revolution to begin,” says [Thomas] Frey.

The conclusions have been expanded into a 20-page report that will be presented in detail ...[it] will explain the following:

1. * The dramatic shift will happen outside our existing education systems sometime within the next two years
2. * It will be greeted by many with open arms, welcomed by most inside our existing education system, but will eventually cause new systems to develop, and schools as we know them today will cease to exist within ten years. Their replacement will be far better
3. * This new system will be able to unlock the hidden potential within us, creating a new grade of human beings - human beings 2.0.
4. * It has the potential to increase the speed of learning ten-fold, and many will be able to complete the entire K-12 curriculum within one year.
5. * People graduating from the equivalent of high school or college in the future will be a factor of ten times smarter than graduates today

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Those are extremely optimistic predictions, given the dismal trends in education in the US generally. I cannot help but agree that any improvements that occur will have to come from outside the current system.

Da Vinci's Thomas Frey is generally optimistic about the future--not just the future of education. But he does not expect everything to change immediately.

Typically, Frey says, it takes time—a quarter-century or so—for new technology to take hold and be accepted. So it’s likely that the next big thing, whether in medicine, transportation or some other arena, already has been invented.

He notes patents filed with the U.S. Patent Office have reached record numbers in recent years. “Knowing that a certain percentage of those filings are cutting-edge technology, and knowing that it takes an entire generation for this to take off, we’re in for one hell of a ride,” he says.

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The new report on Education will be unveiled March 27th in Denver. Contact the Da Vinci Institute for information on attending.

Alternative educational curricula such as the Montessori Method or the Garcia Curriculum, focus on teaching of procedural knowledge--sometimes in preference to didactic knowledge. Such an emphasis is important in creating a sense of competence and self-efficacy in children. Only by doing that, will children build a healthy sense of self-esteem and comfidence in meeting the world on their own terms.