“How we educate our kids is more important than how much”
This is a pretty profound statement. As we grow up, adults were always telling us to get a good education and learn as much as we can. While possessing a lot of knowledge is important, learning how to learn is more important in Globalization 3.0. We should be taught to: learn how to learn. If I had not read the first six chapters of the book, I would have thought Friedman is crazy because it went against a lot of what I have been taught. However, times are changing, and technology is changing so we have to know how to adjust so we can pick up new skills quickly with passion. [Side note: The book “Rich Dad Poor Dad” has a similar philosophy in the fact that just getting a college education isn’t going to be the deciding factor getting you ahead in life.] (although I have only read the first two chapters and it is currently collecting dust on my book-shelf, I am pretty sure the book keeps that message all the way throughout the whole book…)
Friedman gives the equation he came up with as a rule to go by in life:
CQ + PQ >= IQ (or, Curiosity Quotient + Passion Quotient >= IQ)
People with this equation having a greater value on the left side will have the most advantage in flourishing in the global world. It backs up being able to “learn how to learn.” I wish I can sharpen my skills in this department, because I am sometimes lazy when it comes to learning some things. However, if I can see the true value of it in my future, then I have no problem of getting into the mindset that it is interesting to learn.
I thought it was pretty cool that we got to hear (well read) a part of Steve Job’s commencement speech. I had no idea that he was adopted, nor that after he dropped out of college that he would sneak into a calligraphy class and that it actually helped him out. He also spoke about “connecting the dots,” looking backwards leading up to his successful position in life.
Friedman also said that liberal arts should be stressed in school. He says America must learn to work with their right-side of the brain to do things better and innovate, while let foreigners do the left-side of the brain work cheaper for us. I think this was kind of a crappy statement. It is almost if he is making us think that we are better than others and that everyone should be doing lower-skilled jobs and that’s just the way it should be. While maybe he wasn’t trying to be so harsh about this, this is kind of what I pulled from it.
1 comment:
I also wonder about Friedman’s argument that we in the US should focus on big picture horizontal collaboration right brain stuff and let foreigners do the left brain work. First, this contradicts what he said earlier about how US students should focus on math, engineering, and other applied sciences – all left brain fields for everyone but the 1% of S&E people who have a Eureka moment and invent something life-changing. Second, in a flat world, computers will do most left brain activities for us (although in order to collaborate and orchestrate we will still need to have the left brain skills to understand what we are trying to orchestrate). In the near term, I also found Friedman’s comment about outsourcing all routine basic and routine left brain work to foreigners to be a very US-centric viewpoint that goes against all of the global collaboration he speaks of through most of the book.
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