International Education and the Changing Demands of the Job Market

“Revolution” may seem like a frightening word to many, but contained within it is the word “evolution”. While child education in current times is nothing like it was even a decade back, hence education has faced a revolution of sorts, it has also evolved. With each new technology, there comes a new challenge in this age of advancement, and children must adapt with ease. Although the children of today are nothing like their parents of just two or three decades ago, they have to be prepared to manage a new world, so to speak, in terms of the dynamic current employment sphere. What prepares them for this?

Weathering a Career

Dealing with child education, and employment later, are challenges that any parent has to face, whether they like it or not. Parents must face challenges of making sure, to the best of their abilities, that children get an education based on standards of quality, yet one which prepares them to weather the storms of an ever-changing job market today. A simple graduate degree is not enough, and post-graduation, if not higher, is where parents and children who want a quality education, aim to reach and achieve. The kind of skills required for competitive and demanding employment today is only learned if a child has the education that fosters appropriate learning and life skills.

What the Future is All About - Global Quality

Global trends in education and employment (and in any other sphere of life) involve the pairing of children’s cognitive, emotional, and social capabilities of humans with the artificial intelligence of computing devices. Needless to say, this is happening now as well, but this is the key factor that influences the job market and the changes that will occur in it.

The goal of any good educational institute or school is to offer a quality education with a concrete education plan that results in first-class human beings (and not robots) who are able to adapt to new employment environments and embrace challenges and changes themselves as they grow in their careers. Quality education acknowledges and adopts changes in the education system and kind of teaching to facilitate the path of a child’s evolution so they can cope later on. The earlier that new knowledge and ways of thinking are transferred to children, the better the understanding they will have of what to expect and accept for the future.

Can a good education be defined?

Today, what is essentially a “good” education? While there is much debate on what an education of quality entails, it typically implies an education that trains children to meet the demands of the world at large, in terms of certain skills developed and ways to adjust. It also means, in the present era of digitization, a system that prepares children to be global citizens and think diversely, meeting any hurdles and coping with new situations rather than being ambushed by them. Parents strive to propel their children towards quality education in terms of the schools they select and the higher education institutions they opt for. Most parents believe that the quality of education is ensured with international education. Therefore, the influx of Asian students into countries like North America (mostly), the UK and parts of Europe is predominant and growing with each year. If you go by the sheer numbers of international students flocking to universities abroad from their home countries, it may appear that international education beats education in your home country.

Quality Education Connected to the Workplace

Globally, educationalists and other professionals in many areas of employment feel that education, as it stands now, whether abroad or in any country, including India, does not link with employment. This is the reason why, while selecting an adequate candidate for the job, HR teams depend more on interviews and other activities in the choice of a candidate.

In attempts to redesign education, child education and higher education professionals, both in India and abroad, have attempted to address the global job market in the preparation of skills taught in schools and colleges. For instance, training in soft skills plays a large role in curriculum, especially those of engineering and science fields in which students are found lacking in essential interpersonal and communication skills. The main aim of education, and this may be seen mainly in schools of an international cadre, is to ensure that every student must have the preparation of being an active participant in a global economy and a solid democracy.

What an International Education Means

You may wonder whether it is worth spending an arm and a leg on international education for your child when AI is taking over the world. With automation already doing most of the jobs that humans used to get paid to do, you may think that fields like data science and the like may not need any human interaction in the future. The fact is, human involvement will always be required, and as the world gets more fixated on automation, there are those employers who believe that any education plan must involve creativity and innovation, some things that any algorithm will never be able to do.

In international schools, mostly in North America, Asian students excel relative to those local students who attend university. Why? If international education is so good, there should be no dropout rate at all. The answer lies in the fact that international education in and of itself may not be bad, offering students the best curriculum and infrastructure aspects that money can buy. However, the skills inherently existing in students also matter to a large extent. The qualities of loyalty, honesty, diligence, a sense of deep values, and discipline are a must to meet the demands of the growing and evolving employment market.

Investing in International Education

The advantage that an international education gives a child, as far as higher education is concerned, is the broad perspective it offers and its alignment with new trends in technology and the evolving world at large, not just the changing job market. It is true that students from schools abroad have a greater potential to find employment as the opportunities are vast globally. However, there is more that employers look for in fresh graduates rather than simple educational qualifications. The person matters most today, and if the projection of the right candidate meets employers' needs, then the job is in the bag!

Sources:

1. https://www.researchgate.net/publication/292560237_Education_and_the_changing_job_market
2. https://timesofindia.indiatimes.com/blogs/voices/quality-push-and-changing-job-market-will-reconfigure-indias-higher-education-ecosystem/