Change is hard, but change is not difficult. People naturally resist change. But without change and without innovation, everything withers on the vine.
We need an army of big thinkers, of entrepreneurs and innovators, of tech-savvy people who are not afraid of or intimidated by entrenched powers. We need to overcome the political class that keeps us bound to a ridiculously antiquated status quo.
I believe this revolution will be fueled by the younger generation. The older generations are too wedded to political parties, too wedded to romantic memories of what education was like when they were kids, and too wedded to the status quo group that clings to power.
It really is time for everyone to acknowledge the need to open things up in education and to modernize and innovate. We need to think Big and envision the way things could be, and then move to make it happen.
This is not a battle of Left v. Right, or Democrat v. Republican.
It’s a battle of the Industrial Age v. the Digital Age. It’s the Model T vs. the Tesla.
It’s old factory model v the new Internet model. It’s the Luddites v. the future.
We must open up the education industry – and let’s not kid ourselves that it isn’t an industry – we must open it up to entrepreneurs and innovators.
This is how families without means will get access to a world-class education. This is how students who’re not learning in the current model can find an individualized learning environment that will meet their needs.
We are the beneficiaries of start-ups, ventures, and innovation in every other area of life, but we don’t have that in education because it’s a closed system, a closed industry, a closed market. It’s a monopoly. It’s a dead end. And the best and brightest innovators and risk-takers steer way clear of it.
As long as education remains a closed system, we will never see the education equivalents of Google, Facebook, Amazon, Paypal, Wikipedia, or Uber. We won’t see any real innovation that benefits more than a handful of students.
Everyone knows that monopolies suffocate progress. We need to turn our creativity loose and break free from the partisan World War I-style trench warfare that embodies the current debate.
