Lifelong learning - What can polytechnics do?

In a recent interview, Deputy Prime Minister Tharman Shanmugaratnam said that there is still a long way to go in developing a culture of continuous learning in Singapore, with companies here still slow in embracing training. To address this, SkillsFuture Singapore has been targeting small and medium-sized enterprises, which employ the bulk of workers in the country. Here, Mr Clarence Ti, Principal of Ngee Ann Polytechnic, gives his take on why it is key to make lifelong learning core to education.

Much has been said in recent years about the need to prepare Singaporeans for the economy, and one crucial part of the discourse is on the relationship between education and employment.

The world where you learn everything by the time you are 25, and that paper qualification you earn which would give you a life of comfort and security will increasingly disappear.

We are in the midst of a transformation in the education landscape and one key transformation is that of lifelong learning. We will all have to keep on learning. To support this shift, institutes of higher learning, especially polytechnics, will have to transform from being schools for young adults to schools for all ages.

This change has to be fundamental. If we treat adult learning only as an extension, then we would have missed the heart of that transformation. Adult education must move into the core of the polytechnics’ reason for existence.

At Ngee Ann Polytechnic for example, new programmes such as the SkillsFuture Series in Entrepreneurship courses and the Startup Talent Factory programme, will help fresh polytechnic graduates secure placement and training with start-ups.

Enrolment numbers for adults are expected to be about 3,000 this year, growing to about 8,000 over the next five years. At that rate, there would be more adult students enrolled than young adults.

Continuing Education and Training (CET) will increasingly be at the forefront of curriculum and pedagogical innovation, far more than Pre-Employment Training (PET).

Increasingly, the workforce will be going to polytechnics to learn about emerging skills – digital literacy, blockchain, artificial intelligence, IoT, industry 4.0, robotics, cybersecurity, fintech and more. They will need these skills to pivot their careers, to innovate, to better position their companies for competition or simply to understand disruption.

We expect emerging skills curriculum to be progressively introduced in CET before they find their way into PET.

The CET curriculum will also see more remote learning, just-in-time learning, bite-sized training, mobile learning, applied learning and experiential learning incorporated into its pedagogies.

Considering that there are also plenty of private operators in the adult education space, competition will serve to drive the speed of innovation. Polytechnics would have to surround themselves with partners, whether they are content partners, platform partners, or technology partners.

The winners in this education race will be those with better partners and ecosystems, who are able to scale and deploy technologies to create meaningful and engaging learning experiences. The ultimate winners will be the learners.

EDUCATIONS NEED TO UPSKILL FASTER

The acceleration of CET will pose challenges to educators who are resistant to change. It is not easy to change, but educators have to learn the new emerging skills quickly. As educators, we have to be ahead of the curve if we are to be of any value to our students.

None of us had learnt these emerging skills in school. Even those with industry experience might also not have encountered technological disruptions when still working in the industry. We have to learn how to teach something that has never been taught to us, and then teach it to others without the benefit of personal experience.

To overcome this challenge, institutes of higher learning must continuously implement project work and programmes with start-ups and innovative enterprises to trial and pilot emerging technologies. The idea is for educators to experience these technologies themselves and at the same time learn how these technologies can change their way of working.

In the past year, Ngee Ann Polytechnic introduced a staff hackathon so we can learn how tech companies innovate. Start-ups were invited to carry out courses on running a crowdfunding campaign, developing an explainer video, coding a chatbot, conducting a pitch and coding a mobile app. Some of them were alumni who graduated only a few years ago and now know more about these things than we do.

Three polytechnics, Ngee Ann Polytechnic, Singapore Polytechnic and Temasek Polytechnic, also started an incubator, Pollinate, at Block 71 which today houses 14 start-ups. We are now moving beyond helping students learn skills to fill jobs, to helping alumni create jobs and to be more internationalised.

Pollinate will be a place where all can learn about emerging technologies and new job roles, as well as the skills that these job roles require and how manpower can be appropriately trained for them.

Educators need to get into the right frame of mind to find opportunities to learn new skills rapidly and be at the level where they can develop a curriculum, often with industry practitioners, to deliver new programmes.

Everyone who is teaching should expect to teach both young and older adults by the turn of the decade. Educators should expect to deliver courses both offline and online.

Classrooms will increasingly disappear and be reduced to a tablet and an online connection. We have to prepare ourselves to seize the opportunities this new world will bring, or be left behind. Be inspired or completely terrified – either way is good.