How do we educate students to be innovators?

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HOW DO WE EDUCATE STUDENTS TO BE INNOVATORS? Related items

THE EU IS CREATING A LOST

24/04/2013 GENERATION
Knowledge today is a free commodity and growing exponentially. Because it is Guest Contribution by Joop Hazenberg
accessible on every internet-connected device, students who merely know more
than others no longer have a competitive advantage. Students now compete NEW POLICIES FOR THE YOUTH OF
for jobs with talented students around the world who will work for far less. As a TODAY AND TOMORROW: THE
result, the high school and college graduates who will get and keep good jobs in EUROPEAN COMMISSION VIEW
the new global economy and who will contribute solutions to the worlds most Guest Contribution by Koos Richelle
pressing problems are those who can bring what journalist Thomas Friedman
calls a spark of imagination to whatever they do. They will be problem-solvers SAVING EUROPE'S "LOST
who create new ideas for improving products, processes, or services. GENERATION"
Upcoming European Policy Summit by
What does it take to create an innovator? My recent research has turned up some surprising answers to this Friends of Europe and Debating Europe
question. The assumption of many business leaders is that we need more STEM (science, technology, engineering,
and math) education in order to graduate students who can innovate. But the scores of young STEM innovators and JOBS POLICY HOLDS THE KEY TO
social entrepreneurs whom I interviewed learned to innovate most often in spite of their good schoolingnot EUROPES RECOVERY
because of it. Europe's World article by Lszl Andor

David Sengeh and Laura White are two examples. While an engineering undergraduate at Harvard College, David co-
founded the organisation Lebone Solutions, which uses microbial dirt to generate electricity and won a $200,000 prize Categories
in the 2008 World Bank Lighting Africa competition. When I first interviewed him a few days before his commencement
in 2010, David said, I dont remember anything from any of my classes at Harvardexcept for Spanish. Everything Op-ed
Ive learned that I value happened outside of the classroom. Laura is a social entrepreneur who created a swimming Policy Briefing
program for disadvantaged youth when she was fifteen and has since helped start several social ventures. She Report
recently told me that her best courses at Tulane, where she is now a senior, were her two independent studies. Most
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of her other academic requirements simply got in the way of doing what she called her real work.
Discussion Paper
Some argue that innovators like Steve Jobs are born and not made, and so the schooling they get doesnt matter. News article
However, I have come to understand that most young people can be taught to innovate in whatever they do. We are
Trustees Speak Out
all born curious, creative, and imaginative. And the best schoolsfrom pre-k to graduate schoolbuild on and
develop these capabilities. They do so not by delivering more-of-the-same education, but rather with a very different Guest Contribution
education. What and how these schools teach are radically at odds with conventional education. Fact Sheet

Schools that teach innovation focus primarily on teaching students skills and not merely academic contentincluding
critical thinking and problem-solving, effective oral and written communication, and many of the other survival skills I Policy areas
researched in my last book, The Global Achievement Gap (2008). They do so by engaging students in rich and
challenging academic content, but content mastery is not the primary objective of their courses. In all of the classes, Competitive Europe
students must use academic content to pose and solve problems and generate or answer complex questions. They Future of Europe
are required to apply what they have learned and show what they know. Frequently, they do this work in teams.
Global Europe

But it is the culture of learning that is especially different in these schools. Greening Europe
International Development
All of them require collaboration in the classroom because they know that innovation is a team sport. Most courses Life Quality Europe
are interdisciplinary because, in the words of Judy Gilbert, Googles director of talent, problems cannot be understood
or solved within the bright lines of academic subjects. Understanding that innovation, as well as real self-confidence,
come from taking risks and learning from mistakes, teachers at the schools Ive named encourage trial and error. As a
student at a new engineering school in the US, Olin College, told me, We dont talk about failure here. We talk about
iteration. And students must create new knowledge or products in their classes, rather than merely consuming
information passively.

Perhaps my most significant discovery is the extent to which young innovators are much more motivated by intrinsic
rather than extrinsic incentives. Their parents, teachers, and mentors encouraged exploratory play, finding and
pursuing a passion, and giving back. All of the innovators whom I interviewed want to make a difference in the world.
It is this combination of Play, Passion, and Purposerather than the carrots and sticks of grades and competition
used in most classroomsthat best develops the discipline and perseverance required to be a successful innovator.

To graduate all students innovation-ready will require experiments very different from those currently being touted in
education. First, we need to explore ways to assess essential skills with digital portfolios that follow students through
school and better tests like the College and Work Readiness Assessment (www.cae.org.) Second, we need to fund
true R&D labs for educational innovationschools that are developing 21st century approaches to learning. Finally,

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How do we educate students to be innovators? > Friends of Europe > Friends of Europe | Library | Paper 11/26/13 11:33 PM

we need to incorporate a better understanding of how students are motivated to do their best work into our course and
school designs.

Our students want to become innovators. Our economies need them to become innovators. The question is: As
educators, do we have the courage to disrupt conventional wisdom and pursue the innovations that matter most?

Tony Wagner is the first Innovation Education Fellow at the Technology & Entrepreneurship Center at
Harvard. His most recent book, from which this article is adapted, is Creating Innovators: The Making of
Young People Who Will Change The World.

This and other similar topics will be discussed during our May 15 Saving Europes Lost Generation summit.

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