“If you get a C or lower, I’ll buy you a present”
Do you think there is more uncertainty about the future today than there was, say, 50 years ago?<p>Anxiety about school and grades may be an outcome of an increasing sense of uncertainty. The less confident one is about the prospects of the future, the more safety net they will desire. Getting the best possible education is perceived to be the best safety net short of a trust fund.<p>One major difference between 2016 and 1956 is the perceived likelihood (for Americans, anyway) that you&#x27;ll be able to work on an assembly line, or, a customer support group, or that your white collar job will be done on-shore.<p>My advice to my kids was to seek a profession that could not be sent overseas, one way or the other. Such as dentist or lumberjack :-) But of course, we now have hair transplant robots which bodes poorly for both professions.<p>What it means to me is that navigating the rest of the 21st century requires thoughtfulness, sound analytical skills and a sense of agency. People have to be able to understand the relative impact of all manner of dynamic systems in the world, not just technology, but economics and government, and the way they all interact. Then, they need to plan how to do to stay relevant and execute their plan.<p>Learning that seems like a lot to ask from a public high school education these days, yet, I believe I learned it 40 years ago.<p>What has changed?