What has Changed? Blog Post 1

Mr. Winkles Wakes is a short, satirical video that highlights how education has made no advancements in the last hundred years. The video shows that society has made advancements in healthcare, infrastructure, and business but failed to place any value on education. Towards the end of the video, Mr. Winkle found comfort in the teacher-centered classroom that is structured with rows of desks and students taking notes.  Although it was nice to see Mr. Winkle find a cure for his culture shock it was problematic because the classroom was not reflective of the world that the student will be going into after they graduate. 

The teacher's classroom in Mr. Winkle Wakes did not adapt to the changing times. The hospital and businesses in the community all incorporated technology but the teacher and school failed to adapt. According to Did, You Know 2022 people in the United States will have worked an average of 14 jobs by the time they are 38 (Free Working Tricks, 2016).  In the last two years, I have worked 3 different jobs in two different countries. I had to adapt to becoming a teacher in Canada by upgrading my teaching credentials, I have had to work on different online teaching platforms, and I had to transition from ESL teaching to STEM teaching, just in the last month. The world is constantly changing and we need students who are comfortable with adapting and modifying their skills.    

In my lifetime, I have witnessed world protests and terrorist organizations change from top-down to decentralized movements that are continuously adapting. This adaptation is not just confined to social movements. According to Thomas Friedman, the world is moving away from vertically organized production toward a more horizontal playing field (Google [Talks at Google ], 2017). To prove that the world is becoming a horizontal playing field, Friedman outlines six new forms of collaboration that have been transformed by technology. The six sources are outsourcing, offshoring, open-sourcing, supply chaining, insourcing, and Google.     

If you want to start a brand name business you will need to outsource your labor cost to the cheapest markets, open up bank accounts in jurisdictions with the lowest taxes, and use open-source software, such as Freecad, for designing new products. If you want to sell and create your own animal feed you will need to find a supply chain for all the ingredients that you will need and use insourcing, such as UPS, to handle all your logistics. Everything that I have explained can be further researched on Google.  According to Friedman, the six forms of collaboration have been turbocharged with wireless technology, voice-over IP, and file sharing  (Google [Talks at Google ], 2017).   

 According to Friedman, the reason wireless technology turbocharges the six forms of collaboration is that the cost of wireless communication has gone down significantly over the years to the point that almost everyone can afford it (World Affairs, 2019). One of the most popular games in the world right now is called Free Fire. All my students in Thailand loved Free Fire because they all had the capability to play it on their android phones. Although debatable, the increased access that technology brings will transform the global economy to become more equitable between exploited and exploiter countries.  

According to Friedman, the world went from flat to fast. Every year I will read an article about the fastest new internet speed. According to Did, You Know 2022, NTT Japan has successfully tested a fiber optic cable that can push 14 trillion bits per second down in a single strand of fiber (Free Working Tricks, 2016). When I lived in Laos, I had to pay 1000 dollars to set up the fiber infrastructure for my house. When I moved out of my house in Laos, the bars next door changed into educational training centers because of the speed of the new internet connection. Technology is transformative and unfortunately, the school in Mr. Winkles Wakes will have students coming out of the educational system just as lost as Mr. Winkles.

                                                                      References  

Free Working Tricks. (2016, September 3). Did You Know (Officially updated for 2022) [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=u06BXgWbGvA&t=60s 

Google [Talks at Google ]. (2017, May 15). The World is Flat: A Brief History of the 21st Century | Thomas Friedman | Talks at Google [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=44EB4bvnOTA   

Needleman, M. (2008, March 20). Mr. Winkle Wakes [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lm1sCsl2MQY 

World Affairs. (2019, May 7). Tom Friedman: A Technological Brave New World [Video]. YouTube. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gq4kcBpMjT8

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