The cover story of the current Time Magazine is "How to Bring Schools  
into 21st Century." The following Pen Newsblast article hits the  
highlights of the Time article. The link following the article takes  
you to the Executive Summary of the report of the New Commission on  
the Skills of the American Workforce.

HOW TO BRING SCHOOLS INTO 21st CENTURY
For the past five years, the national conversation on education has  
focused on reading scores, math tests and closing the "achievement  
gap" between social classes. This week a new public conversation will  
burst onto the front page, when the New Commission on the Skills of  
the American Workforce, a high-powered, bipartisan assembly of  
education secretaries, business leaders and a former governor  
releases a blueprint for rethinking American education from pre-K to  
12 and beyond to better prepare students to thrive in the global  
economy. While that report includes some controversial proposals,  
there is nonetheless a remarkable consensus among educators and  
business and policy leaders on one key conclusion: we need to bring  
what we teach and how we teach into the 21st century. Right now we're  
aiming too low. Competency in reading and math -- the focus of so  
much No Child Left Behind testing -- is the meager minimum.  
Scientific and technical skills are, likewise, utterly necessary but  
insufficient. Today's economy demands not only a high-level  
competence in the traditional academic disciplines but also what  
might be called 21st century skills. Here's what they are: Knowing  
more about the world; Thinking outside the box; Becoming smarter  
about new sources of information; and Developing good people skills.  
Can our public schools, originally designed to educate workers for  
agrarian life and industrial-age factories, make the necessary shifts?

see: http://skillscommission.org/pdf/exec_sum/ToughChoices_EXECSUM.pdf




Gail J. Price
Multimedia Specialist
National Center for Family Literacy
325 West Main Street, Suite 300
Louisville, KY 40205

Phone: 502 584-1133, ext. 112
Fax: 502 584-0172


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