Teaching the New Basic Skills: Linking Schools, the Economy and Education Reform
A Forum — February 28, 1997
Overview
Today's forum featured Frank Levy, Professor of Urban Economics at the Massachusetts Institute of Technology and Richard Murnane, Professor at the Harvard Graduate School of Education, who presented findings from their much-acclaimed recent book Teaching the New Basic Skills. Through extensive visits to successful businesses and discussions with school administrators, teachers, parents and students, Murnane and Levy have identified three basic skills that young people must develop to succeed in the workplace:
- The "hard skills," including mathematics, problem solving and reading
- The "soft skills," including oral and written communication skills and the ability to work in groups
- The ability to use personal computers at a basic level
The authors also presented evidence, from their research and by others, that America's schools are failing to help students attain these critical skills. As a result, many public policy interventions have been either ineffective or failed to directly address the problems young people face in attaining labor market success. This, in turn, has led to an education system which often wastes its scarce resources.
Addressing the Problem
In researching their book, Murnane and Levy met with employers and educators to determine what lessons from industry would help to improve the American school system. Based on this research, the authors developed five basic "first steps" of an agenda, based on the experiences of successful employers, that apply to schools and address these problems directly:
- engage all stakeholders (e.g., schools, parents, employers) in the education system to ensure that each understands the problem facing young people
- ensure that incentives are installed to encourage young people to obtain the "new basic skills"
- train teachers to emphasize these new basic skills through a combination of classroom and experiential activities
- conduct regular assessments to measure progress and guide the refinement of existing practices
- learn from past mistakes, recognizing that there is no "magic bullet" solution to creating pathways to success for young people
Implications for Public Policy
According to Murnane and Levy, these five "principles" have far-reaching implications for public policy, particularly in current reform initiatives such as school-to-careers and efforts to create national standards. A new focus on these principles and the new basic skills can also drive teacher education and professional development programs, in schools of education and for existing teachers. For example, schools of education can utilize performance-based assessments to license new teachers; as a result, these teachers will be familiar with the use of such assessments and be more prepared to implement them in their own classrooms.
Outreach to community members, especially parents and businesses, to promote the teaching of the new basic skills is also critical. Convincing parents of the need for such reform in the schools is particularly challenging. Evidence indicates that while many parents feel there are problems with schools "in general," most feel that their own child's school is meeting their needs. Coupled with their discussions with parents across the country, this has led Murnane and Levy to conclude that public support for reform initiatives, such as developing higher school standards, is far weaker than is generally assumed by policymakers.
Overcoming these two obstacles will require the involvement of employers as true partners in incorporating new basic skills training into mainstream academia. Business support will help convince parents, teachers and school administrators that these skills are necessary for young people to succeed in the workforce. Not all businesses, however, are supportive of such efforts. While many are engaged in partnering with schools, a large number still feel that schooling is the responsibility of the school system. They, in turn, must be convinced that working directly with the education system will help ensure a steady stream of skilled workers.
While there are still many challenges to address, Murnane and Levy argued that these new basic skills, and the principles that emerge from attempting to address them, provide a strong foundation for education and workforce preparation reform efforts. School-to-careers, academic standards, teacher preparation initiatives and employer practices all provide evidence that these skills transcend all academic areas and workforce sectors and that such skills are crucial to the next--and current--generation of workers.