Learn or leave the market

OUTDATED APPROACH TO LEARNING
We have all been told that you will have a successful life if you study 
hard at school, enter a good university, and graduate with honors. 
Maybe it used to be like that fifty years ago, but not anymore. This 
view of education also became outdated. Many graduates face tough 
job market right away, since colleges still educate using old, “clas-
sical” systems that are not adapted to market changes. If you want 
to find your place in the new market, you first need to learn essential 
life skills. You should work even on your personal qualities. That 
is why it is no longer so important whether you studied at univer-
sity at all or how many degrees you have. What really important 
is whether you meet the requirements of the modern market and 
what you can offer.
Sure, you can learn many great things at college, but they will have 
little to do with your future financial well-being. You can work on 
erudition, critical thinking and expand your horizons, but this does 
not guarantee employment. Moreover, it definitely won’t guar-
antee keeping the same job for even five years. The old recipe for 
a successful career, where formal education was the main ingredient, 
no longer works. It is time to search for new ways.
The lifecycle of professions is now very short, just like the lifecy-
cle of most companies: by the time students receive their bache-
lor’s or master’s degree, it is quite possible that their profession will 
have become irrelevant. Although the number of people with higher 
education is growing across the globe, every third specialist is facing 
the problem of skills mismatch (when the skills do not meet the 
demands of the labor market, even with college education).

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 Chapter 3. Self-education And How to Organize It.
44
Human resources development specialist Ken Robinson argues that 
the current education system is the result of the earlier industrial 
revolution. Back then, educational institutions were created follow-
ing the same model as factories: a bell signaling the start of a lesson, 
breaks, uniforms… This was all based on standardization, but it has 
no place in the modern labor market, even though it continues 
to exist despite all logic and trends. You have to admit, marching 
into the future guided by the experience of the nineteenth century 
is at the very least odd, not to mention that it is also impractical. Due 
to standardization, most people do not even know what talents and 
abilities they might have.
The educational process generally resembles a conveyor belt, even 
in colleges: there is no place for freedom or creativity, all students 
are required to master a standard program and any deviations from 
it are unwelcome. This model was still relevant in the 20th century, 
it made it possible to teach people to perform obediently monoto-
nous repetitive work that is now more and more often done by robots. 
The educational system of the 20th century made it possible to teach 
students a set of skills that would allow them to become specialists 
who could stay in high demand in the labor market for a long time. 
Now, due to the decrease in the lifespan of professions, this situation 
is impossible.