Learning all the time
It is good to be back online after a long and restful summer break. I am looking forward to this Fall season. This Fall, I will focus on helping families find the right schools for their children and also speak on the topic. Amongst my speaking engagements is a talk for the Emerald City Rotary Club on the topic of Education in the 21st Century. I have been asked to focus my talk on the ‘need’ for higher education. It is predicted that higher education will undergo a dramatic change in coming years. As I updated my research this week, I was struck by a more fundamental question. Statistics and common sense tell us that most people head to college for one primary reason – a better job. While college graduates do make 53% more money than diploma holders, I did not come across research on how much college graduates use what they learned in their jobs.
This brings me to my question — How much of your work today is truly connected to what you learned in college or school?
It is obvious that there are those undeniable “basics” that help us function in the workplace. You know; knowing how to read helps you do your work. I think though that as the years roll, we learn more “on the job”. We acquire skills specific to the job but even something beyond that. We learn how to work with people, how to navigate political situations, how to arrive at decisions, how to take risks. We learn to innovate, to present, to learn new material and skills as needed. Those that truly love their work also feel like they make an impact, they “change the world” so to speak in their own small way and find fulfillment and meaning in doing so. Many of these skills, habits of mind, ways of being that we learn on the job are not learned during our years of formal education. Many people struggle at their jobs, learning as they go these softer, less tangible but critical ways of being and working.
In my workshops, parents state their greatest hopes for their children. Second to being happy, most parents hope their child will be a life-long learner. Learning doesn’t happen just in school, while doing homework or when preparing for a test. Parents hope and want for their children to love learning and to do it for a whole lifetime. It is with that hope in my heart that I ask – how can we be learning all time — from birth to death, every waking moment? Just like our minds are alive and curious (hopefully) during the hours and years of formal education, how might we stay awake at other times? How can the urgency to learn on the job transpire all our waking hours?
What helps you learn all the time? What are those intangible ways of being and habits of mind important to you that you have learned just by living life in every moment? I hope you will share your experiences.