generation.com

By Wade H. Tavorn

Planning the Future for our Children

As we enter the new millennium, will we as a community continue to educate our children for the industrial state? Will we continue to read reports that tell us that the education gap between minorities , Caucasians and Asians still persist? Will we still tell our children that wealth comes from land, minerals or productive capital equipment? Or will we tell them the truth or give them the tools so that they can discover it by themselves.

Although we have reduced the size of the classroom, we continue to educate our children for the "industrial state". This practice needs to stop immediately. Our children need tools for the 21st century, not the 20th century. For example, we must train our children to prepare for a career in an economy in which there are no careers. No one in the future will spend 20 years working for one company. It is estimated that between 600,000 and 800,000 people are laid off each year from unprofitable companies. So, in order for our children to maintain there competitive edge, they must prepare themselves to be affective in technology. No career in the future will be able to escape the power of this daily expanding science.

But learning technology along will not be enough, our children must turn the televisions off and learn how to get in touch with their creative self. Creativity will be a big plus to those students who know and understand technology. Therefore, technology and creativity should be the driving forces in education for our children in the new millennium. Our children, better known as, Generation.Com, deserve the best that we have to offer.

Even though school districts continue to make every effort to make the old systems work, the reports on our children's progress informs us that they are not achieving their objective. Fact, only 10 percent of the 4th, 8th and 12th - grade students who scored at the highest level on the National Assessment of Educational Progress tests in reading, math and science were minorities. This data is troubling because we are not just talking about poor disadvantage children, students from relatively wealthy families with well-educated parents preformed poorly. America can not let this trend continue when it is estimated that up to 40 percent of our students under 18 will be minorities by the year 2030. If we are to maintain our superiority in the world, we need to find new ways to educate all of our children. As a community, we need to set goals that include all of all children. And when that happens, good communities, profitable companies will be a by product.

For the first time in the history of the world, the wealthiest man got his wealth from knowledge. We have finally entered the Brainpower Era. This will be an era where more demands will be placed on our skills and knowledge, and these demands will change daily. No longer will school learning and our life experiences be enough to master the new economy for the new millennium.

Therefore, we must insist that our children understand that they will constantly be seeking information to make themselves more productive and valuable to their companies and communities. If this new generation, Generation.Com is to survive, we must prepare them for the Brainpower Era.