EDUPLOYMENT: "Worldwide, young people are three times more likely than their parents to be out of work." It's a disheartening statistic offered by McKinsey & Company in its report on the broken links between education and employment in this day and age. "Education to Employment: Designing a system that works" looks at over 100 education-to-employment initiatives from 25 countries and surveys over 4,000 youths from nine countries, including the U.S. The report finds a serious disconnect between the attitudes of youths, employers, and education providers: "Fewer than half of youth and employers...believe that new graduates are adequately prepared for entry-level positions. Education providers, however, are much more optimistic: 72 percent of them believe new graduates are ready to work." The lengthy report elaborates on ways where the education-to-employment pathway falls short, and calls for bringing the workplace into the classroom and vice versa.
Tom Vander Ark, though, believes the report could use more thorough coverage of existing opportunities to acquire job-related skills offered by the likes of P2PU and Udemy. Also interesting: Udacity is aiming to demonstrate how people who take its classes are finding jobs, even if it does so one job at a time. (Here's a guy who landed a job a Square, with help from Udacity, which earns a finders fee for its help.)
