You’ll forgive us for sounding like a broken record, but discussions about technology in education have been cycling for years now with the same message being conveyed; it needs to catch up.
NZTech held it’s eighth annual meeting the other week where it announced the businesses that make up its community now collectively employ 100,000 people. Chief executive Graeme Muller says the growth of the industry is crucial not just for the sector, but for New Zealand’s economy and the nation’s wellbeing as a whole.
But in a column in Idealog’s 2017 Technology issue, out next week, OMGTech! co-founder and Vend founder Vaughan Rowsell says more needs to be done to equip the future generations so they can flourish in the tech industry.
Seeing as the World Economic Forum report predicts that 65 percent of jobs for primary school aged kids will have as adults don’t actually exist yet, he says it’s essential digital technologies and a strong knowledge of tech are taught to the youth of today.
“Many young New Zealanders don’t believe they can have a career in these [creative and tech] sectors and that is just dumb,” Rowsell says.