Ruth Merrett from the Intel Corporate Affairs team shares her learnings from the Intel Education Summit, where over 120 delegates from 22 countries considered the vital changes needed to education systems to support future economic growth.
What does the modern economy need and how do we inspire economic growth? Challenging the status quo; that’s what the Intel Education Summit has been about so far either as an intended or non-intended consequence. The formal education system is not sufficiently catering for employability skills for young people. Fact.
The will IS there with some practitioners and policy makers but there needs to be a consensus; we all need to move in the same direction; embracing creativity within education. We need a more dramatic shift. Education needs to keep up with the rest of the world and embrace change through technology. Bernadette Andrietti, Intel Director for Europe stated ‘we need to move faster, we don’t have time to wait’.
There are pressing issues such as the low achievement of individuals from poor backgrounds. Lord Jim Knight of Weymouth commented, ‘we need to narrow the attainment gap between rich and poor and part of the answer is to engage parents more effectively’. Technology provides the tools and opportunity for schools to get ‘closer’ to parents and provide them with real-time data so they are ‘closer’ to their child’s school experiences. Engage parents here in the campaign for their children’s growth.
Francesc Pedro from UNESCO commented in his keynote that ‘we need a realistic approach to changing educational practices and use data to drive instruction and improvements. The use and distribution of data for personalised learning cannot be underestimated.
Dr Martina Roth, Global Director for Strategy, Research and Policy commented that for systemic transformation ‘we need a holistic approach that incorporates policy, teacher professional development, curriculum & assessment, ICT and research & evaluation’
The private sector knows a lot about change management, constantly needing to adapt to new situations to stay in business. Education can collaborate with and learn from the private sector. These public private partnerships are key for Education as Education needs to embrace change to stay relevant in today’s society.