Technology and society have changed at high-speed pace over the last few decades, and traditional education can hardly keep up. The rigidity of memorizing facts and figures, as well as inflexible curricula that aren’t tailored to individual student needs, simply aren’t in tune with the Information Age or the political climate that has emerged in recent years. That said, there is already a solution to combat these deficiencies, and it’s already five decades old. Today, we look at the International Baccalaureate as a solution to important problems that our children will face in the future, that might not be solved by other forms of schooling.
One way that technology has disrupted the job marketplace is automation. A lot of tasks are set to become assisted or even fully replaced by automated platforms, and it will fall on an IB education to prepare students with the skills needed to thrive in such a world.
We’ve previously discussed the important skills that children should be learning in school to stay competitive in the future job marketplace, as inspired by the 2016 World Economic Forum report, “The Future of Jobs.” These skills include creativity, cognitive flexibility, problem solving and analytical thinking, and technological literacy.
Through the International Baccalaureate curriculum, students are challenged on collaborative, creative, and critical skills, thanks to the ongoing mission to develop healthy minds according to the IB learner profile.
It’s an important role of parents to instill resilience and build character in their children, but they can’t do this job alone. The school is a part of a child’s emotional and psycho-social development just as much as it governs their cognitive development. Through the work of the IB learner profile, students are enjoined to become independent and risk-taking, as well as caring and open-minded, such that their dealings in the world are fueled by compassion and strong communication.
