What happened to all of the toll takers?

When I recently drove across the Throgs Neck Bridge  and noticed that the toll booths had been replaced by fancy overhead structures with cameras and flashing lights, I couldn’t help but wonder… what happened to the toll takers?
​
If you do a Google image search, you will have difficulty finding any pictures that document the removal of the booths… they just disappeared; well, not exactly (as you can see I don't get out much). If you do travel that road every day and see the change happening, then it is not such a surprise. However, as someone who does not regularly travel over the bridge, and many don't, I woke up one morning, drove over the bridge from Long Island, and realized the landscape has changed; and with it, many jobs that used to exist.

I think of this as a metaphor for education. If we don’t look at the changes that are happening around us and do something to prepare our students while educating our communities, then change will always come as a surprise.

As a high school principal, it is important to me that we seek change and offer opportunities for our students that prepare them for the world outside of our schools.  We must continue to innovate and prepare students for a “modern world,” a world where our students will face opportunities and challenges that are developing at a rapid pace.  If you notice, I chose the term “modern world’ purposefully as we are nearly 20 years into the 21st century. The skill sets that students need today and the jobs that will be available for them are drastically different than the world I grew up in.  

2022 Skill Outlook

Growing

• Analytic thinking and innovation 
• Active learning and learning strategies
• Creativity, originality and initiative 
• Technology design and programming 
• Critical thinking and analysis 
• Complex problem-solving
• Leadership and social influence
• Emotional intelligence 
• Reasoning, problem solving and ideation
• System analysis and evaluation 

Declining

• Manual dexterity, endurance and precision
• Memory, verbal, auditory and spatial abilities 
• Management of financial, material resources 
• Technology installation and maintenance 
• Management of personnel 
• Quality control and safety awareness
• Coordination and time management
• Visual, auditory and speech abilities 
• Technology monitoring and control

Source: Innovate Inside the Box (information taken from the World Economic Forum)

This should lead us to think differently about the purpose of school and the goals we have for ourselves and for our students. How are we preparing our students?

• Focus on the Four Cs - Collaboration, Critical Thinking, Communication, and Creativity are skills necessary across all content areas and are sought after by employers across all disciplines. 
• Build Emotional Intelligence (EQ) - Incorporate Social-emotional learning to hone our own emotional states and those of our students.  These skills help us with our relationships and allow us to build empathy, trust, and the non-academic skills needed for success in life.
  
• Teach Computational and Design Thinking - Computational thinking is so much more than coding in that it fosters logical thinking and problem solving. Design thinking stresses ideation and reasoning skills that promote innovation through iteration.
• Empower Students - So much more than engagement and student voice, empowerment offers choice and builds the capacity for students to develop their passions, experience real-life situations, and a love of learning. It is about ownership and agency. 

The Fourth Industrial Revolution is upon us and we cannot simply focus on the basics or rote learning. Simply knowing the facts isn’t enough. We must remain, as my drive over the Throgs Neck Bridge demonstrated, ready for change or we risk becoming irrelevant, or worse... obsolete. ​

---

“Our job is not to prepare students for something. Our job is to help students prepare themselves for anything.” - AJ Juliani (Empower)