21st Century Skills

I recently came across an article from the World Economic Forum where they identified skills that are valued in the 21st century workforce. (Specific definitions of each of these 16 identified skills are listed in Appendix 1 in the linked article.)  The foundational literacies are the traditional core skills (reading, writing, and arithmetic) with an emphasis on application.  As our economy moves from an industrial production model toward an information technology model, the competencies become more and more important, eloquently articulated by Daniel Pink in his book A Whole New Mind.  But I was primarily interested in the character qualities, asking myself how we, as a Christian school, can help develop those skills.

My mind went to a recent activity I was closely involved with here at HCA.  Mr. Russ Miller and I worked with a group of students and adult mentors who joined with 40+ other teams from a 4-state area in the First Technology Challenge robotics competition in late January.  This competition was the culmination of a process that began in September when the details of this year's competition were announced.  For the next 4 months, a dozen students and 6-7 adult mentors worked to design and build a robot to accomplish the various tasks presented in this competition.  Curiosity was demonstrated as the team discussed various strategies to score the most points.  Students showed initiative by stepping up to the challenge and taking on various elements of the task.  Failure is always are part of the process like this - Edison famously said, "I didn't fail a thousand times to create a light bulb; I was successful in finding 1,000 ways that didn't work."  When faced with a concept that didn't perform as expected, the team was forced to show grit (see previous post) to keep pursuing the goal and adaptability in finding new ways to accomplish the task.  It was a delight to see different students step up a various times during the process to assert leadership, accepting the challenge of a specific part of the task.  And of course, the social dynamic of a group of this size working together for four months required a keen sense of social awareness.

This is only one example of the type of activity that helps students develop these skills.  I could write a similar paragraph on an athletic team, the senior class ministering together on their missions trip, or a group of students preparing for a dramatic production.  The key is that these are all elements of lifelong learning.  In fact, I think you could make the case that those items listed in the 2nd and 3rd columns become more important as life goes on.  And at the end of the day, we want our students to be lifelong learners.

NOTE:  For the record, the rookie Charger Robotics team performed well enough to be chosen to be one of a dozen teams to move on from the qualification rounds to compete in the elimination round.

TRUE GRIT

In the 1969 movie True Grit, Mattie, on a mission of "justice" to avenge her father's death, recruits an ornery, one-eyed federal marshal named Rooster Cogburn (John Wayne) because he has "true grit", a reputation for the ability to get the job done.  In the end (spoiler alert), they get their man with Mattie showing significant grit of her own.

I was recently reading a review of a book by Paul Stolz called Leadership GRIT: What New Research Reveals, a book that is now on my "wish list."  Stolz begins his book by defining leadership GRIT as "the capacity to get your team, or followers in general, to dig deep and do whatever it takes -- even sacrifice, struggle, and suffer -- to achieve their most worthy goals in the best ways."  I couldn't help but notice the similarity between this definition and the "grit" that Mattie was looking for in Rooster Cogburn.

Stolz identifies four dimensions of GRIT as follows:

• Growth - The propensity to seek and consider new ideas, additional alternatives, different approaches, and fresh perspectives.
• Resilience - The capacity to respond constructively to -- and ideally make good use of -- all kinds of adversity.
• Instinct - The gut-level capacity to pursue the right goals in the right way.
• Tenacity - The degree to which you persist, commit to, stick with, and relentlessly work at whatever you choose.

As I looked at this list, I couldn't help but notice that Christians should be uniquely qualified, in the power of the Holy Spirit, to demonstrate "true GRIT".  We are called to "grow in the grace and knowledge of our Lord Jesus Christ." (II Peter 3:18)  James calls us to "consider it all joy" when we are faced with adversity.  (James 1:2)  I recall one translation renders this "count trials as friends" because they are producing character in our lives.  The Christian replaces "gut-level capacity" with a reliance on the Holy Spirit and the Word of God to direct us to the right goals.  Oswald Chambers defines tenacity as "endurance with the absolute certainty that what we are looking for is going to transpire."  This is Biblical hope, defined by John Piper as "a confident expectation and desire for something good in the future" - referred to by the writer of Hebrews as "the full assurance of hope." (Hebrews 6:11) - the hope that motivated the Apostle Paul to say, "I have fought the good fight, I have finished the race, I have kept the faith."

May God give us grace to graduate students with "true grit"! 

NOTE:  See this article which specifically addresses the "resilience" and "tenacity" elements of GRIT.