Leapfrogging

"Leapfrogging" is a term used by economic development specialists to describe strategic decisions by the developing world to sleap over the industrial, fossil fuel-driven technologies and practices of the industrialized world to modern, green, and information technologies. Given the strain on the planet's natural resources and the resulting environmental crises, this strategy may be the only viable option.

Of course, the developing world, desperate for change, gets it more than we do. A case in point is a recent report from OECD reported in eSchool News:

U.S. and European schoolchildren are losing ground to countries such as China and India that are adapting faster to changing needs and producing more of the high-skilled workers the 21st century demands, according to a new report. Richer nations, especially in Europe, face a growing lack of ambition among their children, fed partly by social inequality that schools have failed to redress, it says.

In looking toward future job market needs, the report warned against a "lack of ambition" among youth in many OECD countries that contrasts sharply with families' push to educate children in many developing countries--especially China and India.

David Warlick comments on his blog

In the industrial world, our education system has been so successful for so long, and it has become so ingrained in our sense of cultural expectation and entitlement, and there is so much momentum behind our antique industry-based system that we may well not be able to turn it around in time. We are so well educated, that education has become the goal, not world-readiness. It’s why we spend so much time and effort teaching our students to be good students, instead of paying attention to a rapidly changing world and adapting how and what we teach to prepare our children to prosper in a rapidly changing world.

I'm not sure how accurate this picture is but it resonates with two thinkers I encountered this fall: Dan Pink and Gunther Pauli. Pink, in his book A Whole New Mind, argues that creativity is the most valuable asset a person and nation can have in a global economy. Being able to adapt and evolve while adding meaning and beauty to our experience is where personal and economic value will come in an age of abundance. This means that education is not the right of passage described by Warlick but the lifetime process of engaging with the world.

Pauli developed ZERI, the zero waste design and production philosophy which says there should be no waste in economic production. If designed properly, all waste becomes a natural resource. It is a model that reveals explosive economic potential for anyone who can see beyond the "core business " blinders we typically operate with.

But are we teaching students to get credentials or to to transform the world?

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