Three Cold, Hard Truths That Will Save Higher Education

Technical skills have become essential for nearly 80 percent of middle-skill jobs, but according to a new report, nearly a third (32 percent) of Americans between the ages of 16 and 29 have no work-related computer experience. The report, published by recruitment company Indeed, illustrates the mismatch between employers and job seekers: employers have more open positions requiring computer and technical skills than there are qualified candidates.

As a society, we are investing more into education than ever — millennials are the most educated generation in U.S. history. Higher education used to guarantee a job and a better life, but today only 20 percent of college students feel “very prepared” to enter the workforce.

The sheer enormity of this problem and the multitude of stakeholders involved makes it easy to pass blame around. Instead, we should work together to appreciate and adapt to the growing demand for skilled talent in a technical age that is radically evolving faster than ever before. Here are three truths that I believe the entire education ecosystem needs to take on together:

A one-size-fits-all approach doesn’t work.

Higher education isn’t just about learning a skill — it’s about exploring your interests, developing as a human being, meeting new people, and, for some people, learning how to do your own laundry.

But given the rising costs for higher education, enrolling in college can leave some people worse off. For students in the bottom 25th percentile, a college degree doesn’t always translate into a higher salary:

It’s painfully obvious at this point that a one-size-fits-all, “college for everyone” approach isn’t working, and that people should have more opportunities to explore whether high-quality career and technical education might be better for them.

While most of our students at Flatiron School have graduated college, we also run the NYC Web Development Fellowship exclusively to students without a college degree. It’s incredible to see how students have thrived in the program and gone on to land great jobs at companies like Mastercard and Kickstarter. And considering the recent findings published by recruiting startup Triplebyte — grads of bootcamps are just as prepared for technical interviews and to work as junior developers as those with bachelor’s degrees in computer science.

The student body is much more diverse, too, which is important to us and the tech employers we work with. All the evidence shows that diverse teams at work are a driver of both innovation and business growth.

Education should be better aligned to outcomes.

Unsurprisingly, students expect higher education to prepare them to be successful in the workplace. In a survey of college freshmen, 88 percent cited getting a better job as a vital reason for pursuing a college degree. But there’s a disconnect between the skills and knowledge that colleges believe they’re providing and the actual outcome of that education: only 11% of business leaders perceive college graduates to be ready for work, while 96% of chief academic officers think that students are adequately prepared.

Source: UCLA’s “The American Freshman” report

Our full-stack web development program at Flatiron School teaches students a lot of things — how to collaborate, how to program using languages like Ruby and Javascript, how to communicate complex, technical ideas — but at the end of the day, people sign up for our school, because we get them jobs. We are clear from the get-go about that outcome and the value we’re providing to a student for their financial and time investment. And clearly studies like the one from UCLA show that this is what students are looking for and expect from their schools.

Again, for many students, college plays an essential role in their personal development. But with the average student spending six years getting a degree and taking on $37,000 in debt, schools need to do a better job ensuring that students also gain the skills necessary to launch a career that helps pay down that debt.

Lifelong learning is now a necessity.

Gone are the days when you go to college for four years straight, get a job and work at the same company until you retire. With so much of our world now powered by technology, the rate of change in the workplace is happening at a tremendous pace, and professionals in every industry need find ways to “up skill” throughout their careers. A recent study concluded that, while smart technology and automation may not wipe out jobs, they will undoubtedly affect nearly every occupation, changing the nature of how we work and, more importantly, how we continue to learn.

Source: World Economic Forum’s 2016 Future of Jobs survey

Companies that recognize the inherent value in investing in talent early on will gain a competitive advantage in this new economy and ultimately win out. Many are looking for smarter ways to skill up large parts of their workforce, retraining employees for the skills required to stay competitive today and tomorrow.

While other companies are moving away from sponsoring employees to return to traditional degree programs, as part of professional development, in favor of giving them access to nontraditional education platforms like Lynda or Flatiron School’s online campus.

“Five years from now.”

The ways in which we learn, work and build our lives is evolving so rapidly that the higher education system can no longer support itself. These three truths may be tough for some students, educators and employers to accept, but the ones who do will help ensure education once again becomes the best investment anyone can make.

It won’t be achieved quickly and it won’t be easy, but the good news is that it’s already happening. While we obsess over the opportunities created by new technologies like VR and self-driving cars, we’re also witnessing one of the largest transformations in the history of American education — in both the private sector (for example, Google’s Teachers in Residence program that sends its engineers to teach at HBCUs) and the public sector (like the Department of Education’s EQUIP, which allows colleges and universities to partner with non-traditional education providers like coding bootcamps).

As Phil Libin said (about something completely different), “It won’t happen overnight, but five years from now it’ll feel like it did.”

This article originally appeared on Quartz.