Nine Shift

DC Schools Say Sitting in Chair More Important Than Learning

The Washington DC City Council has passed an emergency one time bill to allow 26 students to graduate high school this month. 

These students have been absent for more than 120 days, but have met all other academic requirements. 

This move is vigorously opposed by the DC Schools, the superintendent of which apparently believes sitting in a chair is more important than learning.  And that keep these 26 smart students out of college is also a good thing. 

Yes, the research shows for MOST students attendance increases learning, duh. But this is only 25 out of 5,000 students who have qualified for graduation due to their learning and knowledge.  

But here's how it goes:  sit in a chair, you graduate.  Learn and acquire knowledge, and you're not going to graduate.  It's the same message sent to Thomas Edison, Bill Gates, Steven Jobs, Mark Zuckerberg, etc. Only now it's almost certainly black males being prohibited from graduating, and for most smart boys it now means one's career devastated and one's contributions to society denied.  

 

 

Where Are the Girls? Working, Stupid

So I get this email this week with the subject line, "Where are the Girls?"  

The press release, from the Pittsburgh Aviation Institute - - which trains aviation mechanics, says that there is a huge retirement now of aviation mechanics and the solution (surprise) is filling the traditional male occupation with females. 

This is the same solution to the shortage of airplane pilots, computer scientists, engineers, mathematicians, large animal veterinarians, physicists, and you name it. 

So I'm wondering where the women are.  Here's the latest statistics:
-Unemployment among women is its lowest in 60 years.
-Unemployment among men is 3.9%, but only 3.6% among women.
- Unemployment among married women is a rock bottom 2.3%  and of course unemployment for any college education person is 2%. 

So while any woman who wants to become a mechanic, pilot or STEMiscist, should. We need more of them. 
But if anyone thinks that women are going to fill the shortage, where would these women come from?  

 

 

 

Advanced Manufacturing Goes Urban, Not Rural

One of the reasons I think our community college friends are big on advanced manufacturing is that they think small cities and even rural areas are, or could, benefit. Not so.

1.Advanced manufacturing growth in big cities.
"Nearly seven times the manufacturing GDP growth in urban American than rural America since 2000. This is unsurprising, since that is where the new workers manufacturing firms need are located," says Michael Hicks, the professor of economics at Ball State University who published his findings in February of 2018.

2.Advanced Manufacturing in just 10 cities.
"Since 2001, 60% of all manufacturing GDP growth has occurred in just 10 cities, the smallest of which is about 2.2 million people. More than one in four metropolitan areas actually lost manufacturing GDP during this period," he says.  

Hicks concludes:

"The simple truth is that US manufacturing is doing extremely well and is enjoying record levels of production. At the same time, the places factories are located and the people who work in them have gone through epic change. The big winners in this transformation are college graduates with technical degrees located in large urban places. This trend will continue for the remainder of the 21st Century."

But wait, someone disagrees with Hicks. That's interesting too. Hang on. 

The Future of Advanced Manufacturing

In my webinar recently on work and jobs in the 21st century, I got push-back from several participants.

I assume they are with a community or technical college, and they cited the growth of Advanced Manufacturing as to why some students do not need a four year college degree.

So here's the research on Advanced Manufacturing:
1.Jobs for College Grads, not high school grads.
  "Since about 2000, manufacturing jobs held by non-college graduates have declined by almost 45%, while manufacturing jobs held by those with a college degree are up nearly 17%. In net, all the new jobs and almost all the replacement jobs in manufacturing are going to college graduates," according to Michael Hicks, professor of economics at Ball State University, in an article in February 2018.

2.Production is up, while employment is down.
"It’s worth noting that total US industrial production is more than twice what it was in 1979, when employment peaked. And yes, of course, that is adjusted for inflation.’

Manufacturing employment, which all too many folks think is a good sign of the industry’s health, is about 1.5 million less than it was at the start of the Great Recession (2008) and about a third lower than at its peak month in 1979." 

This is exactly what NineShift has been saying.  Advanced Manufacturing workers with a four year college degree are indeed knowledge workers.  Stay tuned, because there is more information that we did not predict.  

Should Schools Stop Feeding Boys?

Should schools stop providing lunch to boys who don't behave well?

A teacher in our Gender in the Classroom course noted that taking away recess from students who don't behave is the number #1 response. 

All the research indicates that recess is critical to learning, especially for boys.  Boys with more frequent motion learn more, especially reading and math, other studies show.  The Finns, who have the best schools in the world, say they just give students physical movement several times an hour. 

Bottom line: taking away recess hurts our children's ability to learn.  It would save schools more money if they took away kids' lunch instead, and have the same negative effect!  What do you think? 

Where Millennials Move:

Even major news media, business, and other supposedly leading organizations don't get the 21st century. Here's a good example.

The Minneapolis Star Tribune, and presumably lots of other news media, did a story on what cities people are moving to. The two top ones:  San Antonio and Phoenix.  The two big losers in population:  New York and Los Angeles.  

But that's the wrong question.  And Minneapolis ought to know better.  The true test of a city's economic future is not high school grads and retired people, but college educated people. Minneapolis' future is tied to college grads, which is why it is doing so well.  

The Wall Street Journal, though, asked what cities college grads are moving to.  Yes, New York and Los Angeles are in the top 3.  In fact, here's the list, the same list (plus Portland) of 21st century American cities NineShift has been citing for years.

Where college graduates move to:

 

 1.New York 

 2.Washington 

 3.Los Angeles 

 4.Chicago

 5.San Fran. 

 6.Boston 

 7.Atlanta 

 8.Philadelphia 

 9.Dallas 

10.Houston 

11.Seattle 

12.Denver 

 

 

Why is The New York Times Ignoring the Big Brightline Train Story?

The Brightline train story, which train experts say is huge and could change transportation in America, has been ignored by The New York Times.  Why?

The NYT has only done two stories over the last year on Brightline, the most recent being six months ago. But Brightline began service just a few months ago, and just in the last few weeks extended service to Miami, a big deal 

Train experts say the Brightline story is huge, and may change transportation in America.  Why is the New York Times ignoring this story?  

Happy Virtual Anniversary Me ! !

20 years ago today I blew up my organization's 10,000 square foot national headquarters, with library, conference and seminar room, beautiful desks, an office for my secretary (that's what we called assistants back then), and my vision of an indoor fountain to welcome visitors from all over the world. People from Hong Kong, Australia, and across North American actually did travel to Manhattan, Kansas, to visit us.

I sat on the floor with other staff, the furniture all having been loaded on trucks or sold, and told them our virtual future would be bright.  I actually had no idea how to take my organization, or any organization, virtual. I don't think anyone knew how to run a virtual organization in 1998.  

And then some staff moved to wherever they wanted to move - - Michigan, Missouri, Colorado - - and I moved with my family to Wisconsin.  We closed the office on Friday before U.S. Memorial Day, Julie and I drove up to Wisconsin over the weekend and unpacked and went to work on Tuesday. Other staff resigned.  A few staff created home offices in Manhattan, Kansas and went home to work.  One or two maintained a new small shipping and inventory office that we still have. 

20 years later, I could never work in an office again.  And my organization could never survive with one central office where everyone had to work.  Happy Anniversary LERN.  Happy Anniversary me.