College education and today’s workforce

Introduction

            The present education system for the college students has significant differences with what the former generations went through. The education system trains more of the theoretical work rather than the work related skills. Therefore, many of the grandaunts from the institutions of higher learning and colleges have limited skills to enable them cope with the work environments. College education may not be a good preparation for today’s workforce. It is very crucial that college education be made into more job-oriented as opposed to the life-long learning with a broader-based education. Many jobs in the corporate world have a background of being more of practical than being theoretical. The failure of most of the college education system is the over-emphasis on grades and good presentation papers. However, the good grades acquired are not a preparation for any job-oriented field. Hence, the education acquired becomes important only when it is applied directly in the workplace. Many people disregard the manual work involving working with one’s hands and opt to seek for the office jobs. Working with one’s hands ends up in tangible results unlike being in an office where it is difficult to quantify the results. The paper focuses on a discussion about making the college education job-oriented. Various issues are under discussion in support of the need for having the job-oriented college education systems.

            Most of the educators in the 1990s dismantled the high school shop class programs and introduced a system that prepared students to become knowledge workers. The move then made all the children at the rightful school age forced to pursue academic excellence. However, the anticipated benefits have not yet been realized. It is very unfortunate that even after sending all the children to school to accumulate the academic credentials, there is still need for people to fix and build things. The nature of the education acquired in the classroom setup does not train children to fix out or build things rather than only the theory behind the things fixed or built up. Many of the people who get to college out of influence and not inner satisfaction find it hard to cruise their way through. According to a teacher, in the former education system, the schools ought to create an artificial learning environment for the children to measure their full potential and engage with the reality (Crawford, 2009). The chance of working with the hands eliminates the notion that the world is abstract and distant. The society places certain identities to those who chose not to acquire academic credentials for other reasons. Some people have talents and gifts in particular fields and do not require much of the college education for them to maneuver their way. Therefore, there is not only a single gate for success in life.

            According to Anderson & Gordon (2014, the key policy makers in the education sector should make various changes to the current education system to make it more job-oriented. The system in place trains learners to be book toppers. Among the changes is adding mini projects in the curriculum and ensuring that they are compulsory. The projects are effective ways of involving both the learner’s knowledge and the hands into the job-oriented tasks. The mini projects can be in the form of simple experiments that students do and then make observations from them. The move drains them away from the common copying from the internet without imparting anything beneficial to them.

            The other change is making the curriculum more practical oriented that theory oriented. Research is necessary for a college education. Whenever students carry out individual research work, they develop the job-oriented skills on the basis of the research work is practical. It is necessary to update the curriculum in such a way that it aligns to the work-related tasks. The present education curriculums have remained unchanged for a long time. Another move is striving towards changing the people’s mindset about being successful. The common trend in the corridors of success has a close association with the accumulation of academic credentials. However, being educated does not only imply having the academic papers, but also being able to apply practically the knowledge in real life (Anderson & Gordon, 2014).

            According to the Indian Express (2013) the employability of the grandaunts from the institutions of higher learning is always challenging. A recent study reveals that most of the people produced by the institutions of higher learning are unemployable in any sector. The major reason is a lack of job-related skills like poor functional roles, poor communication skills, and limited concept-based learning. The worst affected are the students who graduate with the courses that require more of practical work than theoretical. Jacobs (2011) argues that the labor economists and educators believe that the career driven courses should be the common choice for the students. Therefore, they ought to pursue the skills-oriented fields of study that they know are liable to offer good job opportunities.

            The current trends in the economic sectors require people with certain skills in their fields of expertise. According to Crawford (2009), there aren’t many jobs that can be reduced to rule-following. Most of them require the hands-on experiences for the learner to have a practical case that is similar to that of the daily work experiences. Rule following is the common experience that college education expose students to that tends to lure them to cram the rules that cannot be applicable in the work related tasks.

            Crawford (2009) claims that a good job requires a field of action in which an individual can put the best capacities to work and see an effect in the world. It involves the use of hands to carry out certain tasks that produce tangible results. The notion by many scholars that they have to land in the white collar jobs is misleading because there is a high shortage of such jobs all over the world. The best strategy is focusing on improving the world by impacting the knowledge acquired in college in the manual related tasks. Responsibility has to have a foundation for the mental understanding through habit and perception. Traders develop certain skills through their interactions with the customers. In most instances, the experiences are hard but it reflects the perception of the world and the habitual responses of an individual. Work that has the orientation of face to face interactions between the customer and the trader are very effective in impacting the job-oriented skills.

Conclusion
            In conclusion, the analysis of the present college education shows limited preparation of the learners to today’s workforce. Most of the learning activities are not task-oriented. Hence, college graduates have fewer skills required in the work related tasks. There is a need of changing the current education system to make it more beneficial to the learners. They require acquiring the work-related skills from the institutions of learning so that they have a full preparation for today’s workforce.

Works cited

"More Students Focus Schooling on Skills to Land Job" Techniques: Connecting Education &      Careers 82.7 (2007): 58. Retrieved on 26 Apr. 2015

Anderson, Gordon L. "The Reaction against Conventional Knowledge in Higher Education" On The Horizon 22.1 (2014): 57-66. Retrieved on 26 Apr. 2015

Indian Express “Make Higher Education More Job-Oriented,” (2013) 

Joanne Jacobs “In a tough economy, new focus on job-oriented certificates,” (2011) 

Matthew B. Crawford “The case for working with Your Hands,” 

Carolyn Morgan is the author of this paper. A senior editor at MeldaResearch.Com in college research paper services. If you need a similar paper you can place your order from best medical essay service.