Are you prepared to enter the workforce?

Michigan State University's Career Services Network has published the Twelve Essentials for Success. http://careernetwork.msu.edu/pdf/Competencies.pdf Here are the skills or competencies we must learn:

1. Working in a Diverse Environment

Learning from people who are different from

you—and recognizing your commonalities—is an

important part of your education and essential

preparation for the world you will join.

2. Managing Time and Priorities

Managing how you spend your time, and on

what, is essential in today’s world. Learn how to

sort priorities so you stay in control of your life.

3. Acquiring Knowledge

Learning how to learn is just as important as the

knowledge itself. No matter what your future

holds, you’ll continue to learn every day of your

life.

4. Thinking Critically

Developing solid critical thinking skills means

you’ll be confident to handle autonomy, make

sound decisions, and find the connection

between opportunities you have to learn and

how those opportunities will affect your future.

5. Communicating Effectively

Developing listening, interpreting, and speaking

skills is just as important as reading and writing.

6. Solving Problems

You may only have thought about problemsolving

when you’re faced with a crisis.

Understand the process and mind-set of successful

problem-solving and you’ll more easily handle

the bigger challenges that come your way

7. Contributing to a Team

In the workplace each person’s contribution is

essential to success. Having the ability to work

collaboratively with others is vital. This includes

identifying individual strengths (yours and

others) and harnessing them for the group,

building consensus, knowing when to lead and

when to follow, and appreciating group dynamics.

8. Navigating Across Boundaries

Life is filled with boundaries—good and bad.

Discover how to avoid the boundaries that

become barriers so you don’t hamper the ability

to collaborate with other people.

9. Performing with Integrity

It only takes one bad instance to destroy years

of good faith and good relationships. It’s

important to develop a code of ethics and

principles to guide your life.

10. Developing Professional Competencies

The end of college is the beginning of a new

education. Build on what you already know and

keep learning new skills—your job will challenge

you to grow and develop in ways you haven’t

imagined yet.

11. Balancing Work and Life

You’ve got a lot to accomplish in limited time.

How do you get it all done and still stay sane?

The key is maintaining balance among the

different parts of your life.

12. Embracing Change

Just about every aspect of life is in a constant

state of change. Sometimes it may seem that no

sooner do you get caught up than you have to

start all over again. No matter how you feel

about change, you have to learn to deal with it.

Multimedia | Stand Up with Comedian Pete Dominick on Sirius XM Radio

Multimedia Stand Up with Comedian Pete Dominick on Sirius XM Radio: "The Incredible Progression of Technology
By Pete Dominick on Sep 17, 2010 in Multimedia
Check out this amazing video about the progression of technology. It’s got a great soundtrack, too!"

Cenk Uygur&Robert Reich-"What Obama's Done Wrong On The Economy"-Pt.2

Critical Thinking Competencies

In the next twenty years, according to latest census data, 80 percent of the world’s population will be “nonwhite.” By 2020, nearly 21% of the American population will either be Hispanic, African American, Asian, or Native American:

Population
	Percentage 1995	Percentage 2005	Percentage 2020
Whites, Non Hispanic	83%	81.3%	79%
Hispanic	10.2%	12.6%	16.3%
African American	12.6%	13.2%	14%
Asian American	3.6%	4.6%	6.1%
Native American	0.9%	0.9%	1%
Source: Workforce 2020, Hudson Institute

The number one “competency” that employers demand as they review applicants for employment is the “ability to work in a diverse environment.” Acquiring, learning, such a competency requires continuous self-improvement to develop certain intellectual traits, dispositions or virtues:

• Fair-mindedness
• Empathy
• Humility
• Autonomy
• Integrity
• Courage
• Perseverance
• Confidence in Reason

For me, the ultimate goal of “critical thinking” is to foster the development of these “traits”. My life purpose is “building true community.” Being and living the change I want to create, requires that I therefore become a “critical thinker.” To me, this also means that I must become a “creative thinker” as the two go hand-in-hand. Being a critical thinker is about assessing or judging, and being a creative thinker is about building, producing or making. I want to be able to both assess and produce, which requires imagination as well as intellectual rigor. Thus, I seek to be authentic—show up and take action that is true to myself, in alignment with my own values and beliefs and true/fair to others, in keeping with universal laws/principles. Thinking critically and creatively is becoming increasing important as change keeps accelerating in our global, complex, and interdependent world—a world that is also becoming more and more dangerous as inequity and poverty persist amidst abundance.

As a “teacher” or builder of learning communities, I hold critical/creative thinking (CCT) at the center of both learning and education. CCT has been defined as “the process of analyzing and assessing thinking with a view to improving [thinking].” (Elder, 2004) In order to accomplish this, we need to know the structures of thinking, the elements of thought, as well as the standards for thinking. Thinking can be improved by restructuring it as a result of analysis and assessment. (Ibid)

Thinking can be shallow, dishonest and based on flawed logic or it can be founded on intellectual fairmindedness. Fairminded, critical/creative thinkers are intellectually humble and empathic. They have confidence in reason and intellectual integrity and display intellectual courage and autonomy. There are also CTT competencies that focus on the elements of reasoning such as purpose, goals, and objectives; those that focus on universal intellectual standards; those that deal with barriers to sound reasoning such as egocentricity and sociocentric thought; those competencies that highlight CCT critical to learning itself; and those focusing on the specific domains or disciplines of thought such as ethical reasoning ability and skills in detecting media bias and propaganda. Each of these areas of competency must include principles of CTT, performance indicators, outcomes, and rubrics to determine the extent to which learners/students display achievement of outcomes and also the extent to which we understand and internalize the particular competence (see www.criticalthinking.org. )

(For a helpful resource see: Elder, Paul and Linda. (2006) Critical Thinking Competency Standards. The Foundation for Critical Thinking which can be found at the url above.)

Next, I intend to present the other competencies required by the nation’s employers and show how all of them are connected to CCT. More later…

Siemens Connectivism Article Summary

The Siemens's article provides an overview of the three traditional theories of learning; presents significant trends or forces impacting the field of learning; and critiques these theories in light of the changing environment particularly with regard to the unprecedented use of technology. Startling to me: the amount of knowledge in world is doubling every 18 months! He then presents his theory of Connectivism and how it could help us create learning environments in keeping with current reality, and keep pace with changing reality, I suppose.

Seimens references Driscoll (2000) in defining Learning and then uses the three traditional learning theories in helping us to understand what learning means, has meant, in the “old days.” Now he says we need to be concerned with the value of what is being learned as well as the manner in which we acquire information. His next statement is: “The need to evaluate the worthiness of learning something is a meta-skill that is applied before learning itself begins”. Surely, both the process of learning and the manner by which we acquire information, as well as the value and use of what is being learned is each, and all, important. An integration of the three old theories and this new one would be helpful.

Wikepedia shows this: learning is commonly defined as a process that brings together cognitive, emotional, and environmental influences and experiences for acquiring, enhancing, or making changes in one's knowledge, skills, values, and world views (Illeris, 2000; Ormorod, 1995). Note that both process and content are considered important; essential to “learning.”

http://www.youtube.com/user/gregaloha#p/p/209BAC7DAACFEDBC/0/a5-Wk2cwb68 helps clarify the concept of Connectivism; and the world-wide, open online course that Seimens created with a buddy is really cool. See below at:

http://ltc.umanitoba.ca/wiki/Connectivism

Course Description: Connectivism and Connective Knowledge is a twelve week course that will explore the concepts of connectivism and connective knowledge and explore their application as a framework for theories of teaching and learning. It will outline a connectivist understanding of educational systems of the future. This course will help participants make sense of the transformative impact of technology in teaching and learning over the last decade. The voices calling for reform do so from many perspectives, with some suggesting 'new learners' require different learning models, others suggesting reform is needed due to globalization and increased competition, and still others suggesting technology is the salvation for the shortfalls evident in the system today. While each of these views tell us about the need for change, they overlook the primary reasons why change is required.

Date: September 14, 2009 - December 6, 2009

Technologies Used: Through out this "course" participants will use a variety of technologies. For example, participants will use blogs, Second Life, Page Flakes, attend UStream sessions, attend Elluminate sessions, participate in discussions in Moodle forums, and so on. Additional technologies will be introduced as is required to attend to concerns or opportunities arising over the next 12 weeks.

Question: What is Second Life? Page Flackes”? Elluminate sessions?

Finally, I’m interested in making sure our social networks used in higher education are substantive, and rewarding, not just catering to our addictive habits of “clicking for clicking sake”. See David’s article!!

PS I'm still learning how to upload the video!! Help this baby boomer become a bit more techi???

Connectivism

Beginning to consider Siemen's article on learning theory in the digital age and how it relates to social media. I'm linking this to my interest in David Rock's work on how our brain functions. See his article in Huffington Post:

http://www.huffingtonpost.com/david-rock/are-our-minds-going-the-w_b_389163.html

More later...

Mission

Writing online, collaborating with students, colleagues, citizens, and friends, is a new endeavor. My passions include eliminating racism, strive2thrive, continuous learning, behaviorial economics, leadership and community based participatory research leading to improved health, prosperity and enhanced well-being. I intend to create a site that informs, educates, illuminates, and calls us to action--creating the future for ourselves and our planet that we all want and need.