WARNING! This website is no longer actively maintained. It is an archive of 2 years work by Doug Belshaw who now blogs at dougbelshaw.com...
In the 19th century a debate raged between such luminaries as Matthew Arnold, T.H. Huxley and Herbert Spencer as to the purpose of education. The debate surrounded the issue of whether a ‘liberal education’ was sufficient for a man of the world in the post-Darwinian era. Huxley and Spencer argued that it wasn’t, Huxley famously denouncing Arnold’s idea of ‘culture’ in a speech given on the opening of a technical college.
Whilst there was somewhat of a dichotomy at this time between the old and new schools of thought, something that both parties agreed upon was the importance of a balance between ‘training’ and ‘education’. Training was the passing on of necessary skills so that a particular function could be performed. Education, on the other hand, was a good in and of itself, important for enobling the mind. Whilst those arguing for the inclusion of a more scientific curriculum wanted a greater element of ‘training’, this was not to the exclusion of traditional ‘education’.
The Guardian reports that a recent survey of employers has found that they believe schools are, ‘failing to equip young people with the practical skills they need for work.’
Andy Powell, Chief Executive of Edge (the practical learning foundation) stated that:
Employers are frustrated that young people of all abilities are finding it harder to cope in their early years at work because they have been stifled in the classroom and textbook learning rather than seeing and experiencing how they learn is applied in the world outside.
Whilst I suppose this is an oblique reference to the lack of extra-curricular learning that takes place nowadays for fear of litigation, it does bring up the issue of the purpose of education. Is it simply to prepare pupils for the world of work? I hope not, just as I hope young people don’t go to university simply for the job they hope to get at the end of their studies.
I doubt, as is mentioned in the Guardian’s article, that it is schools that are responsible for the current crop’s lack of skills in the areas of ‘team working, communication and time keeping.’ If anything, teaching is becoming more interactive and more pupil-centred. I hope we don’t throw the baby out with the bathwater and abandon academic rigour for work-related ‘training’. I think, as people on both sides of the debate realised at the end of the 19th century, we need to strike a healthy balance… 
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