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Home » Reading, writing, and robotics
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Reading, writing, and robotics

August 2, 2019
David Maloney
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My wife, Cathy, is a teacher who comes from a family of educators. Her father taught history for 35 years, and her brother is a public school superintendent.

Recently, she shared with me how the establishment of public education paralleled the Industrial Revolution. As traditionally agrarian societies in America and Europe gave way to industrialization, people moved to cities to work in factories and quickly needed skills beyond farming.

Beginning in the mid-1800s, education, which was once the privilege of the wealthy, began to expand to other economic groups. The emphasis in what was taught shifted away from the classics—Latin, Greek, and ancient history—to the more practical subjects of reading, writing, math, and science.

In England, the Factory Act of 1833 required two hours a day of compulsory education for children working in factories. In 1852, Massachusetts became the first U.S. state to require each town to operate a grammar school.

Widespread compulsory education did not catch on in the U.S. until the 1920s and was viewed as one way to integrate immigrants into American culture. Gradually, education came to be seen as a right.

Just as at the start of the Industrial Revolution, public education today is at a crossroads. An often-cited McKinsey & Co. report from 2017 predicted that robots would replace some 800 million workers worldwide by 2030. In advanced economies, the report said, up to one-third of workers may need to be retrained to find new jobs.

Today, more than half of the fastest-growing jobs in the U.S. are STEM (science, technology, engineering, and math)-related and nearly 80 percent of future careers are expected to require some of these skills. Yet studies show that less than one-third of current U.S. 8th graders demonstrate proficiency in math and science. Only 16 percent of high-school students say they are interested in a STEM career.

We have already seen how difficult it is to find technicians to install and maintain the ever-advancing automated systems in today's manufacturing and distribution facilities. As these systems grow in number and complexity, keeping up with the rising demand will be extremely challenging.

Just as the Industrial Revolution spurred the spread of public education, the robotic revolution must spur a widespread rethinking of how and what students are taught. As students head back to their classrooms this month and next, we encourage schools to place greater emphasis on STEM subjects, problem solving, and critical thinking to better prepare them to meet the future.

Material Handling Supply Chain Services Ergonomic & Assist Equipment Robotics
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Davidmaloney
David Maloney has been a journalist for more than 35 years and is currently the editorial director for DC Velocity and Supply Chain Quarterly magazines. In this role, he is responsible for the editorial content of both brands of Agile Business Media. Dave joined DC Velocity in April of 2004. Prior to that, he was a senior editor for Modern Materials Handling magazine. Dave also has extensive experience as a broadcast journalist. Before writing for supply chain publications, he was a journalist, television producer and director in Pittsburgh. Dave combines a background of reporting on logistics with his video production experience to bring new opportunities to DC Velocity readers, including web videos highlighting top distribution and logistics facilities, webcasts and other cross-media projects. He continues to live and work in the Pittsburgh area.

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