Quote:
Originally Posted by RizzyKing
Given the amount of IT kit i have seen delivered into the secondary school across the road from me i cannot understand how any kid these days lacks basic ICT skills.
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Believe me, a lot of teenagers that I encounter (and I encounter a lot as part of my job) do lack IT skills.
The problem is, as far as I can make out, that when teaching ICT schools, schools teach pupils the essentials of using Microsoft Office and Windows based products.
Don't get me wrong, that in itself is not a bad thing. Where it is bad is that while they are very good at using various business packages, very few students that I see come into Uni (and for those that don't go to Uni, they go into the workforce) have any real understanding of the technology that underpins those packages (and even the operating system that runs them).
This is not an understanding that most people need, any more than a driver needs to know how the engine that is powering their car really works.
The problem occurs when companies need access to that kind of knowledge. People that only have a knowledge of Office are not really any good when a company needs someone to train for a more involved task, such as coding for the OS running a new device, or designing and installing a major telecoms network (whether its internal to a company or a national telecoms network). These companies are being forced to go abroad to get qualified workers. This not only hurts our teenagers employment opportunities, but also, ultimately, will render the country non-competitive (assuming it hasn't already) in an industry that is a core foundation for most future industrial opportunities.
Think about that.
Most of the potential future opportunities for our country will involve computers at some level. Those computers will require software. We are breeding a generation of people that have been bought up with access to computers since birth, but are unable to program them.
We are are also bringing up a generation of people that will probably have trouble when Microsoft software is replaced with the next big thing. If you think I am being alarmist, maybe I am, but it's a matter of fact that in computing the current big thing (which at this point in time is Microsoft) has repeatedly been replaced with the next big thing. If it hadn't, our pupils would be learning Multiplan and running it on CP/M rather than learning Excel and running it on Windows.
I personally feel that teaching ICT is a good thing. However, I think we also need to start teaching pupils things that are a little lower level than what we teach now. Things like how computers actually work at the OS level, and how to program (in Java or C++ rather than VBScript).