Waiting for innovation

Following up on the last two posts, I was recently at an OECD meeting on computer games and education, Seminario video juegos y educaci0n, sponsored by the Chilean Minestry of Education.

I was talking, as usual, about the importance of education for innovation and the role that epistemic games might play in that process–in other words, the themes of How Computer Games Help Children Learn.

A question that came up is one that I’ve been hearing more and more these days: Are there countries that are already thinking in new ways about their education system?

The unspoken part of that question is more interesting, though. In effect, the real question is: Couldn’t we let someone else figure out a better way to prepare kids for the digital age, so we can just copy them?

I don’t have any data on this point (yet)–and I would love to hear from anyone who does. But if you take seriously the data on the falling prominence of traditional leaders in advanced degrees, it suggests that playing catch-up in innovation isn’t really the way to go….