Education vs Training Debate
There is a long standing debate in higher education - education vs training. I have been in education only environments, training only environments, and a mix. I will tell you that a balance between education and training is needed.
If you just focus on training, then you end up with someone who is unable to understand what is going on and has issues with problem solving. If you just focus on education, then you have someone who has no skills and unable to function in a work environment. Unfortunately, I see this quite often in the IT education world. Students take a bunch of classes which focuses on very little hands-on and ends up with no skills to be able to find a job with. This is a huge issue.
My attitude now is we need 50% hands-on training and 50% education. Students need to understand the underlying principles of the training they are doing but they need to develop skills to be employable. Employers are unwilling to take on on-the-job-training for a new graduate these days. I understand why. It takes about 2 or more years to get a new graduate employable and billable. That is a lot of money to invest in someone. But, employers still need to provide training to on board the new employee but that training should be focused on that particular job but not on the key knowledge and skills they should be coming into the job with. Unfortunately, the consulting industry provides the type of training that should be in colleges. They should be doing more advanced training and learning the tools and technologies particular to their needs. But, that rarely occurs right now.
As educators, we must provide project-based experiences to students. They will be motivated and willing to work harder with these type of experiences. They get inquisitive and start asking the right questions about how things work under the hood.
There is a long standing debate in higher education - education vs training. I have been in education only environments, training only environments, and a mix. I will tell you that a balance between education and training is needed.
If you just focus on training, then you end up with someone who is unable to understand what is going on and has issues with problem solving. If you just focus on education, then you have someone who has no skills and unable to function in a work environment. Unfortunately, I see this quite often in the IT education world. Students take a bunch of classes which focuses on very little hands-on and ends up with no skills to be able to find a job with. This is a huge issue.
My attitude now is we need 50% hands-on training and 50% education. Students need to understand the underlying principles of the training they are doing but they need to develop skills to be employable. Employers are unwilling to take on on-the-job-training for a new graduate these days. I understand why. It takes about 2 or more years to get a new graduate employable and billable. That is a lot of money to invest in someone. But, employers still need to provide training to on board the new employee but that training should be focused on that particular job but not on the key knowledge and skills they should be coming into the job with. Unfortunately, the consulting industry provides the type of training that should be in colleges. They should be doing more advanced training and learning the tools and technologies particular to their needs. But, that rarely occurs right now.
As educators, we must provide project-based experiences to students. They will be motivated and willing to work harder with these type of experiences. They get inquisitive and start asking the right questions about how things work under the hood.
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