It turned out that 40% of people will soon lose their jobs if they don’t retrain

And schoolchildren are waiting for professions that still exist only on paper

“MK” wrote a lot about the introduction of vocational classes in schools and the development of career guidance. In vain, it turns out – a HSE study has proven that two thirds of today’s schoolchildren will work in professions that do not yet exist. And examples are given: “architect of multi-cloud solutions”, “legal technoethicist”. Scientists argue that such specialties are not futurism, but the everyday routine of tomorrow. Moreover: researchers claim that 40% of adults need to retrain now, otherwise they will lose their jobs within five years. A similar fate awaits about 1 billion people on Earth by 2030…

Experts from the Institute of Statistical Research and Economics at the Higher School of Economics obtained these results after surveying more than 400 scientists in the “field of human potential.” And this is not all that they are dumbfounded by. Not just computer literacy and the ability to program at a basic level will be introduced everywhere, but working with big data (Big Data) – everyone should be able to do this. Even the descriptions of professions look like a futurologist’s dream: a geoanalyst, for example, studying “spatial data.” Or an architect of multi-cloud solutions. This is not a professional dreamer at all – an unrecognized genius, but an IT specialist who is engaged in “the development and implementation of cloud infrastructure and the company’s computing strategy.” That is, it keeps statistics and does analytics based on network connection data.

A similar list contains the “Atlas of Professions” of the future, compiled several years ago. There, too, everyone was not listed, including an online evangelist, a cyber researcher, or a moderator of platforms for communicating with government agencies. But it seemed that all this was in the distant future, no closer than 2050, at least…

HSE experts call the digitalization of education and the ability to learn the main factors for successful adaptation to the new labor market. The popular “live, learn” is now being transformed into lifelong learning.

The researchers specifically noted that their findings apply to those who started school in 2016 or later. So, in order to get a job as a molecular nutritionist or a 3D printing designer in construction, schoolchildren need to develop “soft skills” from infancy. Early development, numerous clubs and lots and lots of studying. And higher education, according to the authors of the report, is moving from skill based, basic skills, to soft skills, flexible knowledge or multi-competencies, the collection of which is constantly being replenished. Otherwise, researchers threaten future students, you will be left without a job.

It turns out that our universities, at the very least, correspond to fashion trends, developing the “2+2+2” reform, when with each level of training a student changes the direction of training, eventually receiving a diploma with 2-3 specialties. Although, against such a background, the return of a specialty with 6 years of preparation is a little “out of line.” But, indeed, there are areas where you need to study for a long time: “high” engineering, mathematical analytics, biotechnology and medicine… But schools, where digitalization has stalled and are increasingly talking about the return of the “good old” Soviet traditions, are moving in the opposite direction direction. Through the efforts of Duma members, “labor education” was returned to school. And in most schedules, “technology” will be massively replaced by “works” – of course, old ones, but are they really “good”?..

“I don’t quite agree that schools are so lagging behind,” says teacher and methodologist Anastasia Gordeeva. — Yes, it has become more difficult to purchase electronic equipment due to sanctions, there is a difference between schools in this regard. But we develop those same soft skills. These include interdisciplinary subjects, such as life safety, social science, MHC, optional discussion clubs and reports. This is functional literacy. Parents often argue, saying, why in the literature test are there tasks involving the calculation of certain quantities, and in the Russian language work there is suddenly a logic problem. And this is it, “functional literacy,” which precisely forms the child’s metasubject ability. There are many clubs in schools; for example, we have 14 of them, half of which are free. There are a lot of projects, independent modeling – our school generally has a separate lesson “Project activities”.

“Yes, I wouldn’t really worry about the children here,” adds neuropsychologist Svetlana Borisova. — Children are the most adaptively mobile group of the population. And career guidance is also not at all superfluous; it can be one of 2-3 areas that will later make up the profession. Even if everyone becomes a “one-man band” of different skills, something will prevail. I’m more worried about the adults here. Cognitive function in people declines after 45 years, but what is even worse is the loss of cognitive flexibility, the ability to adapt to new things, respond to changing situations and adapt. In order not to lose this flexibility, you really need to “learn to learn” from childhood. But even in adulthood, the cognitive function of the brain is well supported, for example, by learning a new language. And it’s not so important whether it’s foreign or some kind of machine.