School

The Year the Playground Went Quiet

Frank Diana Fertility Decline, Future Scenarios , , , , , ,

What falling fertility rates are telling us – and where the silence leads

Across the globe, people are having fewer children – and having them later, if at all.

Fertility rates are falling in nearly every major economy, and not just slightly. In country after country, birth rates have slipped well below the 2.1 births per woman needed to maintain a stable population. South Korea now sits below 0.8. Japan, Italy, Spain, and China all hover below 1.4. Even in the United States – long a statistical outlier – births have declined steadily for over a decade, hitting a 30-year low during the pandemic.

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Education As The Bridge Between Eras

Frank Diana Education, Future Scenarios , , , , ,

In the mid-1800s, when operating steam-driven machines required a skilled workforce, education helped the working class emerge from a period of stagnation. Later, high school helped ease the transition from the farm to the factory and office. We find ourselves straddling two eras again. The world economic forum estimates that sixty-five percent of children today will end up in careers that do not exist yet.

Our goal is to double the world’s GDP. That’s a very audacious goal. But education is the only thing that has ever done it in the past. It can jumpstart entire economies

Sebastian Thrun – Chairman and co-founder of Udacity

So here we are again. Education must emerge as the bridge between eras. It must ensure that those educated embody the qualities and competencies essential to life in a society different than our industrial past.

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