This special edition of the Harvard Business Review explains America’s unready state for competing in the global marketplace. And it points an accusatory finger at our education system. U.S. public education—according to HBR authors—is “neither world class nor reflective of the large sums spent on [it].” It’s also a system that struggles to “produce employable workers.” In short, it’s broken. Luckily, there are solutions. In her education-specific article (the only one in the bunch), the Gates Foundation’s Stacey Childress (formerly an HBS professor) promotes the use of technology to improve and personalize content delivery. Suggestions from other contributors include calling on the business community and business schools to invest locally in schools (a call recently echoed by Governor Jindal) and to increase the number of apprenticeship and internship-type programs for high schoolers. At the higher-education level, authors pushed for curricula better aligned with the needs of employers. Those seeking a primer on U.S. competitiveness may wish to have a look. And to supporters of career-readiness efforts: This issue provides much fodder for a revamped approach to vocational and technical education as well.
“Special report: Reinventing America,” Harvard Business Review 90, no. 3 (March 2012).
