On December 14, 2006, the New Commission on the Skills of the American Workforce, a high-powered, bipartisan assembly of Education Secretaries and business, government and other education leaders, released its recommendations for radical changes in the American education system and workforce. The Commission’s report, Tough Times or Touch Choices, reviewed education and workforce statistics and research and recommended major changes that they say must be implemented immediately lest the American way of life (our high standard of living) be threatened.
The report included quantitative and qualitative scorecards for both the U.S. education system and the U.S. workforce. The scorecards were used to compare the U.S. to other nations in terms of educational achievement and contribution to the global economy.
Not surprisingly, the Commission found that Americans will find themselves unable to compete with their global competitors who are better educated and able to accept as much as 83% less pay to perform the same work.
The report further asserts that the American standard of living will decline significantly, creating a greater gulf between rich and poor due to outsourcing of routine work and lack of skills required to take higher-level more creative or strategic roles in growth industries.
The Commission found that the U.S. ranks at or near the bottom of every ranking for educational achievement–from test scores to number of students currently enrolled in college.
Ultimately, the Commission concludes that in order to change our current trajectory (a hell-bound spiral into uncompetitiveness), the U.S. will need to reinvent the education system to include a robust pre-K system, State-funded but autonomous schools that focus more heavily on creativity, teamwork, innovation and emotional intelligence (EQ), and allow students to test out of high school and into college.
The Commission concludes the report by making recommendations for changes in the way the American workforce is trained as adults. The report recommends enabling working adults the opportunity to learn new literacy and job skills in order to compete for jobs in growth industries.
Key among their recommendations for changes in the way that we prepare and re-skill our workforce are the following:
- Radically change the education system to include universal early education, curriculum focused on creativity and innovation and new assessments and Board exams
- The Commission calls for the creation of Personal Competitiveness Accounts, continuing education accounts set up by the government when a new U.S. citizen is born and used to pay for college tuition and continuing education costs. The account’s initial balance would be $500 and the government will add money to the account until the citizen is age 16. After that, the individual citizen and his/her employer could contribute to the account tax-free and use it to cover job-related training as needed.
- Creating regional competitiveness authorities that effectively determine which industries are growth industries within the region, and which skills and training are most needed. The authorities’ would also determine what types of training will be funded for regional workforces.
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