THE FUTURE IS NOT JUST ABOUT NEW TECHNOLOGY, SAYS AUTHOR
▶ Futurist writer Gerd Leonhard wants young people to learn how to be human in an automated world
A leading European author and futurist wants educationists in the region to shift their focus from all things scientific to honing human and soft skills in children.
Gerd Leonhard, author of 2016 book Technology versus Humanity, discussed the future of education at the Global Education Supplies and Solutions event, an annual education show in Dubai.
According to Mr Leonhard, children will need people skills, imagination and compassion to navigate a future in which machines will be able to work as engineers.
“The future is not just about technology and this is something that would be good for the region to understand,” Mr Leonhard told The National.
“The region needs to find its own way. Maybe we don’t just need a minister of artificial intelligence, maybe we also need a minster for emotional intelligence.
“In 10 years’ time, technology will be so powerful that it will be able to do a lot of things humans can, including programming.
“So it does not make sense to plan on people having technical careers only.
“The solution to employment is not technology.”
He said human beings started thinking like machines and lost their creativity.
“We have more relationships with screens than we do with people. Let’s put the human back into education,” he said.
Mr Leonhard said a computer scientist may easily find a job today, but that may change in a decade.
“Stem – science, technology, engineering, mathematics – seems like a good objective now, but in a few years machines will learn how to programme,” he said.
“Humanities, ethics, imagination, creativity, combined with Stem, would be ideal.”
The author said engineers should also learn negotiation skills and develop emotional intelligence to prepare themselves for the future.
“Technology and humanity are coming together. Science fiction is becoming fact. This is scary but amazing,” he said.
“Any job that can be done by a computer in the next 10 years, will be done by a computer in the next 10 years.
“If your job is routine, computers will learn it.”
Mr Leonhard said any job that required improvisation, conversation or making a moral judgment would be difficult for machines to do.
“A computer cannot simulate creativity, it doesn’t have imagination,” he said.
“Creativity, compassion, intuition, imagination, values, empathy, ethics, understanding, making judgments are the skills of the future.”
Machines now understand languages and in a few years, computers will speak with people and have opinions.
“If you work like a robot, you will not work in the future. The future of work lies in honing personality skills,” he said.
Last year, experts told The National schools across the region needed to do more to teach pupils life skills such as personal finance and cooking.
Schools in the UAE and elsewhere realise the importance of integrating well-being and emotional intelligence into the curriculum.
Dr Rabaa Al Sumaiti, assistant undersecretary for the performance improvement sector at the Ministry of Education, said the UAE’s moral education programme focused on the emotional intelligence and well-being of pupils.
She said the programme was revised annually. Public and private schools in the country now integrate moral education with different subjects.
“In addition to this, we have programmes to engage pupils. Pupils are taught to respect each other,” she said.
In Ireland, pupils between 7 and 10, spend 400 hours studying well-being every year.
Philip O’Callaghan, managing director at The Super Generation, an Irish company creating resources for wellbeing lessons, said a third of the schools in Ireland followed their Learn to Learn programme, which helped to create confident and engaged children.
“It helps children to become better learners, gives them strategies and helps them stay confident and connected,” Mr O’Callaghan said.