21st Century Skills

The Power of Place: Exploring the Future of Readiness in a Local Context

Across the U.S and beyond, stakeholders invested in creating positive futures for young people face a critical window of choice. The rise of smart machines is altering the ways that humans can and will engage in the workforce in the future, and our notion of what constitutes a “job” is changing as work becomes more taskified and project-based. These shifts require us to look beyond our current definitions of readiness and redefine what today’s young people will need to thrive in the future.

How to Help Students Land the STEM Jobs of the Future


Four Reasons Why Students—and Teachers—Need SEL Embedded Into School All Day, Every Day

It’s no secret that educators who champion the whole-child approach also laud social and emotional learning (SEL) for its scientifically linked success in creating a productive, positive, less stressful school climate.

6 Key Principles That Make Finnish Education a Success

I’ve worked as an elementary and primary school teacher here in Finland for more than a decade, and spent five years as a vice principal as well. Our education system is widely considered one of the best, if not the best, in the world.

Britannica CEO Talks Google, Wikipedia and What Lil Pump Can Teach Us About Credibility

There was a time not long ago when people claimed to trust Google news results and Wikipedia articles more than the media outlets they linked to. In other words, up until pretty recently Googling was synonymous with a question answered.

Can an AR and VR Pilot Program From Google Prepare Kids for Future Careers?

Virtual reality has been the driving force behind Google’s Expeditions app since it launched three years ago. And recently it’s added another layer of “reality” to the virtual field trip tool—AR, or augmented reality to be precise, which take the form of features such as narration, annotations, and a new “solo mode,” going on virtual trips without a guide.

How a Classics Education Prepares Students for a Modern World

Your scientists were so preoccupied with whether they could, that they didn’t stop to think if they should.Ian Malcolm, Jurassic ParkAs described in our modern mythical tale, Jurassic Park, technology may not always lead to positive outcomes if implemented without critical thought, moral ground or inquiry. From cloning to social media, it is more essential to understand the ethical implications of an idea and how it will impact people than it is to build well-designed code.

The Future of Education Depends on Social Emotional Learning: Here’s Why

Social and emotional abilities are said to be indicators of how well a person adjusts to his or her environment, adapts to change and, ultimately, how successful she or he will be in life. In fact, core development abilities such as conscientiousness, emotional stability, openness, and agreeableness can be as or even more important than cognitive intelligence in determining future employment. Despite these competencies being related to consequential life outcomes, it can be challenging for educators to find effective ways to prioritize, teach and assess social and emotional skills.


I often hear people question whether teachers are willing to embrace technology, but if we really want to transform teaching and learning, I think the better question is, “Are we willing to change our expectations for how and what students learn?” If we only focus on the latest programs, makerspaces or the devices rather than on creating powerful learning experiences that align with the type of skills and character traits we want students to develop, we will continue to perpetuate the same norms in education with more expensive tools.

Teaching Kids Finance and Smart Spending With Cryptocurrency

Show a fourth grader how to balance a checkbook and it won’t be long before her eyes start to glaze over or his mind starts to wander off to more interesting things. Infuse a financial literacy lesson with terms like bitcoin or cryptocurrency, however, and the lesson gets a bit more interesting. Better yet, give the student a very hands-on, tech-centric way to experiment with those financial concepts, and suddenly you’re in an entirely new learning realm.

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