iPads for Kids: a Necessity?

The Chicago Public Schools recently spent $450,000 to provide nearly two dozen schools with 32 iPads each. Judging from this article, the kids aren't really doing anything with their iPads that couldn't be done with a teacher. But school administrators are hopeful that this will prepare kids for the future.

Do your kids need an iPad? I wouldn't worry about it if I were you. Kids are very good at picking up computer skills whenever they're introduced to them. So if your kids don't get near an iPad until they're older, they won't have missed out on anything. But a 5-year-old who spends hours on an iPad every day is missing out on what 5-year-olds should be doing, like playing outside, making art and learning about the world around them. How about getting the basics (reading, writing, arithmetic) down before becoming addicted to technology? After all, technology is not the only topic our kids will need to be well-versed on.

Thriving Through Mastery

I'm not crazy about the title of this wonderful article by Gary North, "Time to Get Rich." I think it misleads the reader into thinking it's another of those smarmy get-rich-quick articles, and it's nothing like that. In fact, it explains the opposite: how young people can invest time in mastering certain skills so that they benefit throughout their lives.  It's certainly worth your time if you're a parent who's concerned about raising children who will thrive in the new economy!

The Evidence Piles Up Against Attending College

I'm not saying no one should go to college. Here's what I say in Thriving in the 21st Century:

You now know that the greatest amount of job growth is predicted in areas that don’t require college, that most kids who attend college don’t graduate in four years and many don’t graduate at all, that college is getting more expensive by the minute and that borrowing to pay those high college costs can have lifelong consequences. You also know now that having a college degree does not guarantee a high income…or any income at all.


Knowing these things, if you still think your child should go to college, please think hard about the following questions and whether you can answer “yes” to most of them:



• Is your child very intelligent and hardworking?

• Does your child have his/her heart set on a career that can only be accessed with a college diploma in hand?

• Of the careers that require at least some college education, is your child interested in one that offers the best return on the considerable college investment?

• Has your child thoroughly researched the chosen career, including talking to employers in the field to see what kind of education they require, and graduates in the chosen program to see if they’re a) employed and b) satisfied?

• Is your child’s choice of major/career one that’s likely to be in demand by employers? (Just because a college offers a major doesn’t necessarily mean that major is in demand by employers. There’s no correlation between number of majors and number of available jobs.)

• Is your child’s choice of major/career one that can be used in more than one industry? (Example: business administration)

• Is your child’s choice of major/career one that will be difficult or impossible to off-shore (as opposed to an area of study that’s currently being chosen by millions of smart young people from China and India)?

• Does your child’s chosen college or university have a reputation for academic excellence?

• Will your child be able to graduate debt-free? In an economy where wages are stagnating and periods of unemployment or time between careers is common, living debt-free will be a major asset as well as a source of emotional peace.

• If your child will need some student loan funding, does he or she plan to earn a degree that is likely to help them earn enough to pay back their debt within a few years (there are no guarantees)?



Regarding the last question, keep in mind that the debt will have to be paid back during a time when wages most likely will continue to stagnate. As a result, college loan repayments could eat up the lion’s share of your child’s future paychecks.

“Yes” answers to most of these questions indicate that you have a child who is motivated to go to college and willing to do what it takes to earn a degree in a field with good prospects for personal satisfaction as well as employment. If you don’t have enough money saved up for the entire four (or more) years, consider sending your child for two years of general education courses at a community college, after which your child can transfer to a four-year college. This is a time-honored plan, and for good reason: it saves a lot of money on tuition and room and board, plus you’ll send a more mature person off to college. Also, if your child’s chosen field of study will require graduate courses, the money you save by sending him/her to community college the first two years can help defray the cost of graduate studies later on.

If you can’t answer “yes” to most of the questions listed above, consider whether college is really the answer for your child. Try to ignore the common wisdom of the 20th century that was drummed into your head, the refrain that insisted that the only sure route to success requires a college diploma, because times have changed.

So I'm not against college, but I think it's clear that college is not for everyone or even for most people. Between its high cost and the questionable need for a degree for employment in areas of job growth, there's a lot of evidence on my side, and it's piling up:

More college grads are settling for low-wage jobs

More college grads are having trouble paying back their student loans

An economist argues that college is not a bubble, it's a "tax-subsidized failure"

See what I mean?

Book Update

Thriving in the 21st Century: Preparing Our Children For The New Economic Reality is at the printer; we're awaiting the delivery of proof copies this week. The book will be out in April!

Newbies to this site may not know that I began investigating the changes in the economy several years ago, when my husband's manufacturing-related business began slowing down due to increasing competition in his industry from China. Once I realized how much the economy was changing, I began to study how to prepare our children for a very different world of work than the one my generation had known; my study led me to write this book.

Here's the back cover copy for Thriving in the 21st Century:

Today’s children will reach adulthood in an economic environment unlike anything the world has ever seen. The 21st century global economy is powered by an increasing rate of technological change as well as growing foreign competition; both are contributing to the high U.S. unemployment rate and stagnating American wages. How can we as parents prepare our children for success in this growing maelstrom that many are now calling “the new normal”?

In Thriving in the 21st Century, Barbara Frank demonstrates that we must move beyond the common wisdom of the 20th century that emphasized a college diploma and lifelong employment with a large company as the only way to success. Instead, we need to set our children on a new path, one that will help them not just survive, but thrive in the 21st century.

In this book, you’ll learn:

• The Seven Strengths your child will need to prosper in the 21st century, why they’re needed and how you can develop them in your children
• The most efficient (and increasingly popular) way to give your child those Seven Strengths
• Why public education has failed to prepare our children for the 21st century
• How we can help our children become the lifelong learners needed in a rapidly changing global economy
• The surprising truth about today’s colleges and universities
• How economic change is affecting a variety of career areas, and which of them are projected to grow dramatically in the coming years.

This book is packed with ideas and resources for raising our children to become adults who respond proactively when faced with economic challenges, and who can prosper during times of great change. We can help our children reach young adulthood ready and able to tackle the future with all its challenges. And that, of course, is the key: we must prepare our children for the future…not the past.

I'll share more information as it becomes available. Keep an eye on this site!

Are College Students Really Learning?

A new study indicates that college students' academic skills don't show much improvement by the end of the sophomore year. The sociologists conducting the study found that the students they studied weren't asked to do the kind of intensive work (large amounts of weekly reading and writing) that were once the hallmark of a college education. That could explain the lack of learning.

Yet college tuition continues to rise each year. Why should parents pay more for less?

Empathetic Workers are in Demand

The graphic that accompanies this article clearly shows that all areas of employment have been in decline in this country except "Education and Health Services":



It's the only area that has had positive employment (green) throughout the past two years. This is also where most of the projected job growth of the future is expected. And one of the Seven Strengths detailed in my upcoming book Thriving in the 21st Century is required for those who want to work in education and health services: Empathy.

Empathetic people make great teachers because they put themselves in their students' shoes in order to relate to them and to present concepts to them in a meaningful way. Empathetic people make great healthcare workers because they treat patients the way they would want to be treated.

If you can raise your kids to be empathetic, you'll make them more employable in the only big job growth area we Americans have going for us now and in the near future.

College Debt Slavery in America is On the Rise

Now that the federal government is in charge of most college student loan debt, expect more of these sad stories. And don't expect the government to understand and forgive:

To collect on federal loans, the Education Department can seize borrowers’ paychecks, tax refunds and Social Security payments without a court order -- as much as 15 percent of a borrower’s disposable income.

The department is currently authorized to collect tax refunds and Social Security from 3.4 million borrowers. About 98,000 borrowers are having their wages garnisheed, the agency said.

In part because of those powers and the laws discouraging bankruptcy discharge, the department estimates it will collect 100 percent of the dollar value of all defaulted student loans.

The result? As one woman said, "I'm going to be in debt until I die."

Many college grads cannot find work. The days when a college degree guaranteed a job are over. Think hard before you send your children to college unless you can afford it without putting them in debt.

Why You've Got to Teach Your Kids About Money

Money's tight for many people these days; even those who have good, well-paying jobs or businesses should be socking away money in case their fortunes change. This is a smart thing to do, and one reason why you'll want to teach your children to handle money wisely before they leave home.

Another good reason is that many companies are now running credit checks on their prospective employees. Some, like this woman, cannot find a job because, within a few months of losing her last job, she ran out of money to make her house payment and went into foreclosure. Now she can't save her house unless she gets a job, and she can't get a job because of her house.

Don't let your kids be caught in a Catch-22 situation like that someday.

Making Sure Your Kids Develop Practical Skills

With an iffy economy and an uncertain economic future, you can't go wrong teaching your kids practical skills. But if you don't have the time or the experience to do this, there's another way to make sure the job gets done. This blog post has the answers you need to raise kids with practical skills if you can't do it yourself.

Just Because a College Offers a Certain Major....

....doesn't mean the major provides a degree in an industry that offers any hope of growth, or a future job.

This article made me so sad because I was once a journalism student. While I don’t believe I was as idealistic as some of the students quoted, I enjoyed every bit of my journalism education, and looked forward to a career in journalism. A lousy economy at the time of my graduation ruined that dream for me back then.

Today, these kids are graduating into a lousy economy and a deteriorating journalism scene (the original version of this article included comments from recent journalism grads who can’t find work). The rise of the Internet and the clear bias of American media have resulted in newspapers dropping like flies. Yes, there are far more writing opportunities online than in print, but they pay less, too. It’s much harder to make a living as a journalist now than it was 30 years ago when I graduated during the Carter years.

Yet the professors quoted in the article let the students believe that “it’s all going to be ok” when they surely know better. Gotta keep those paychecks coming in, I guess. (Same reason so many colleges and universities inflate grades these days, but I digress….)

The moral of this story? Just because a college offers a specific major does not mean your child will be able to find work after obtaining that degree. Help your child make a wise career choice. Check out specific careers and their predicted futures at http://www.bls.gov/. Most of all, don’t believe the hype of colleges that need to keep a certain number of warm bodies coming through their departments in order to maintain their own employment.

College Grads and Unemployment: Will This Affect Them for Life?

The rate of unemployment among recent college grads has doubled, and many of those who have jobs are not working in their chosen field, or even in a job that requires a degree. Will this experience scar them for life or make them stronger? You decide.

Here's Your Diploma....and Your Bill for $24K

According to a recent survey, the average new college grad owes $24,000 in student loan debt at a time when the unemployment rate for college grads has set a record by jumping from 5.8% to 8.7%....in one year!

Keep in mind that the lower-than-average unemployment rate of college grads is partly due to them taking jobs that don't require a college degree because they need something to help pay back the loans that come due within a year after graduation. That explains why there are an awful lot of college-educated truck drivers and burger flippers at work these days.

Entrepreneurism vs. College

The writer of this article makes the case that increased entrepreneurism is what our country will need in the future, and that a college education is highly overrated when it comes to preparing people to fix what ails us economically.

There are many interesting points in this article, and some thought-provoking comments after it, adding up to more evidence that we need to be raising entrepreneurial kids!

Public Schools are Old School

The public school system was designed to train children for the 20th century world of work in factories and offices. Those days are gone, but the school system just keeps doing things the way they've always been done.

To truly prepare our children for the 21st century, public school is not the answer. But maybe you've already wondered about this. You might be interested in reading "Ten Signs That You Need to Find a Different Kind of Education for Your Child."

Are Schools Killing Our Children's Creativity?

In a rapidly changing economic environment, thinking creatively can help people make good decisions when faced with challenging problems. Our children will need to be creative in order to make a living in the 21st century. But are schools crippling their creativity? This video makes the case that they are.

What do you think?

Learning a Foreign Language (or Two)

Our 19-year-old wants to be a police officer and was recently told by our local police that the way to move to the top of the new hires list is to be able to speak Spanish.

Many employers now look for bilingual employees, and Spanish isn't the only language they seek. Chinese is becoming increasingly important in the new economy, and other languages are also considered an asset. In a world where employment is not always easy to come by, our children will need the advantage of knowing a foreign language.

Young children pick up foreign languages quickly. Why not let them learn another language with some of the great products now available?

Our Children Will Need to Be Good Communicators

It's vital that our children grow up learning how to communicate effectively through writing. In an era of texting and chatspeak, this isn't always easy to manage.

But employers will always value workers who can get across a point clearly and concisely. It's an advantage for the self-employed, too, because being able to write your own website copy and do it well is a real money-saver.

Schoolchildren aren't always taught to write well. But we parents can make sure our children learn this important skill. This report (PDF), while written for homeschooling parents, offers plenty of tips and ideas for all parents who want their children to become good writers.

Americans are Catching On

More and more people are realizing that the economy of the 21st century isn't going to get better any time soon. This is why we need to prepare our children carefully for the future: preparing them the way we were prepared makes no sense, because getting a college degree is no longer a guarantee of anything except a big expense.

It's not that none of our children will need to go to college. But all of our children will need to develop the specific strengths that will get them ready to thrive in the 21st century.

At Least Somebody's Teaching Kids These Skills

Over in England, a chain of hardware stores has begun offering classes to teach children basic survival skills, since their parents either don't have the time or the ability to do so. 

Glad to hear that some young people are going to learn these skills. Wonder when they'll start teaching basic skills on this side of the pond?

How Did This Happen?

You may wonder how our economy got to the point where it is now. I think Charles Hugh Smith summarizes it pretty well.

The middle class filled the growing gap between stagnant earnings and steep increases in living costs, healthcare (a.k.a. sickcare), education, and housing with a second income (Mom, aunty, sister and Grandma all entered the workforce en masse) during the 1970s, and then they filled the still-widening gap in the 80s, 90s and 2000s with ever-expanding debt.

The dot-com bubble provided the illusion that permanently rising equities would painlessly fill the gap (pension plans were happy to join in the mass delusion). When that fantasy imploded, it was quickly replaced with the exact same fantasy, only this time based on housing.

Hence our current economic troubles. The bottom line? Our children's future will be much different from the world we've been accustomed to for the past 30 years. It will be harder for many people to earn money. Our kids are going to need a variety of skills, not just a sheepskin.