Shift Teaching Forward: Advancing Career Skills to Prepare Tomorrow's Workforce

Shift Teaching Forward

Advancing Career Skills to Prepare Tomorrow's Workforce

Kelly Cassaro

with Dana Lee

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Published by John Wiley & Sons, Inc., Hoboken, New Jersey.

Published simultaneously in Canada.

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This book is dedicated to my grandfather Vincenzo (James) Pesce who always taught us to find a career you love, no matter what. He didn't believe that one job was better than another. He believed that you were the ingredient that mattered. If you worked as hard as you could and strived to achieve at high levels, you could find true fulfillment in life and earn a living to support your family.

He likely felt this way because after he served in World War II, he wanted, with all his heart, to take advantage of the GI Bill and become a teacher. However, he felt he couldn't go to school because he needed to support his non‐English speaking immigrant parents. He instead apprenticed for free until he was good enough to be hired as a welder at a Pittsburgh ship building company and, over time, became a foreman at the same company, leading a team of over 100.

He taught me that education and hard work can change your life. And it has for me.

Thanks, Pap.

Introduction

Even as a child, I knew teaching was the most important job on Earth. At age five, I declared that I was going to be a teacher. I never wavered.

As I continued my education, my belief in the power of education to change lives only strengthened. I have found joy and both personal and professional progress through the skills and knowledge that education offered to me: escaping to another place with a good book, overcoming a lack of confidence by learning to crisply defend an argument, building community by working together with peers to accomplish a goal, and opening doors to global travel through my work in supporting career trainings around the world.

Everyone on Earth deserves meaningful education and the transformative impact it has on one's life. As well, everyone on Earth deserves the dignity and security that come from sustaining, satisfying employment. The link between the two is solid—even as the landscape of career opportunities shifts before our eyes, ever more quickly as the speed of technological advancement refuses to slow down. Demand for some of the 20th century's most steady, reliable jobs continues to fizzle out while many of today's in‐demand jobs didn't even exist when I was in school.

The most seasoned educators may find it daunting to connect educational experiences of today with the unknown, often mysterious job and career marketplace of tomorrow. No one has a crystal ball. Yet, educators and trainers must design learning experiences as if they do. This is no small feat, but it can be done.

After all, excellent educators have made the impossible possible for ages. The current moment is no different. Some jobs of the future may not yet exist, but educators and trainers can still make an incredible impact right now on their learners' future employability. Educators and trainers understand the value of education and want doors of opportunity flung wide open for students, especially in our rapidly changing post‐pandemic world. And this means they'll do everything they can to see around corners and guide their learners toward successful careers—both with new strategies and with traditional, tried‐and‐true methods applied in new ways.

That is what Shift Teaching Forward is all about—equipping educators and trainers with the rationale and know‐how to guide their practice so they can better prepare learners for the world of work in which they'll one day thrive.

Shift Teaching Forward offers practical strategies to bridge the gap between education and employment. This book is intended for all educators and trainers who support learners in preparing for a career: teachers, designers, administrators, and nonprofit leaders within a variety of settings, including high schools, vocational schools, community‐based programs, colleges, universities, and corporations.

My teaching journey has spanned early childhood to adult education. The lessons I have learned through those varied experiences throughout the years have had me continuously saying, I wish I had known that when I was in the classroom. My first teaching position in the South Bronx, New York, was in a third‐grade classroom with students from Ghana and Gambia, and some did not yet speak English fluently. While we did read amazing books together and learn about history, art, and geography, there was a laser focus on standardized tests; any discussions about the future stopped at high school graduation/college admissions. While the educators sometimes had cross‐grade professional development, the pressure and intensity were on meeting urgent, tested curricular requirements. The immediate application of learnings from other grade levels was not clear. The mandate to cover standards for third grade was, however, abundantly clear.

I continued as a classroom teacher for seven years and added kindergarten and first‐grade teaching to my résumé. I fell in love with teaching and, at the same time, realized the cruel realities facing educators in the United States. I felt compelled to experience other roles within the sector and aimed to position myself to influence change. After classroom teaching, I've held positions ranging from leading professional development for a network of schools, leading recruitment of teachers, driving the overall academic program, creating curriculum for adult education, and leading a global team of educators in pursuit of developing programs and methodologies to support adults into meaningful employment that can change their lives.

Although I have held many roles within the field of education, the first seven years in the classroom were certainly the most challenging. I gave my all to improving my craft to better serve my students. I poured a lot into my students and left little for myself. I know you do the same. I know these are the contexts you bring with you when reading a book like this. You're hungry for ideas, strategies, and inspiration, and you need to be able to bring all that into your own classroom, training center, or virtual video conference. You know the world is changing, and your learners need to be ready for whatever comes next. That doesn't change the reality in which you do your work, day in and day out.

The challenges I faced—the same that I see so many of my peers, friends, and family continue to face—only strengthened my resolve to improve others' lives, especially the lives of teachers. I often consider a speech from Pulitzer Prize winner Anna Quindlen, who's had a long and rewarding career as an author. She noted, Teachers are the second most powerful group of people in your life. A teacher said to me, ‘You are a writer’ in a way that was undeniable, and it shaped my entire future. If you are holding this book (thank you!), chances are you hold the same awesome power as that teacher held for Ms. Quindlen—the power to support a student in shaping their life's trajectory. You have the power to ensure your teaching is transformational instead of transactional. You have the power to form partnerships with the community, seize opportunities, and foster the curiosities and talents of students. You have the power to prepare them for a thriving career—even if neither you, nor them, has any idea what shape that career will take.

You have the power to make a powerful mindset shift away from what has long been known and established—that college prep is the core role of K–12 learning, and that the best employment pathways involve predictable and well‐trodden paths. This shift requires opening your mind to the role of career preparation no matter the context in which you teach, embracing the integration of employability and social‐emotional learning skills in daily classroom life, and choosing optimism in the face of incredible uncertainty and technological change. It's a big shift, especially when so much of your role already requires you to go above and beyond any job description in print. Yet it's a needed shift that will bring joy and marketable skills to your learners.

Over the past seven years, I've had the great privilege of traveling the world to see adult training in action. The settings have ranged from employer‐embedded training programs, massive government training initiatives, and smaller, community‐based initiatives. I've sat alongside workers, shoulder‐to‐shoulder, and witnessed a variety of professions in action, including stitching‐machine operators in Pakistan, construction helpers in Texas, and disability support workers in Australia. These hands‐on experiences have offered me an understanding of the day in and day out of many professions, including the common threads that run through roles that seemingly would not have much in common. I have spoken to countless employers about what makes a high‐performing employee and have been able to pull out trends applicable across sectors. I am also fortunate that through these varied experiences, I have learned from the most incredible colleagues. Through these experiences, I've collected learnings and strategies to support educators in the incredible responsibility of preparing learners to thrive in their careers and, more broadly, their lives.

My experiences have given me insights into what students need from their education in order to succeed in our rapidly changing workplace. I have witnessed our current education system transforming student lives, but I have also observed and studied the gaps between what our students' current education offers them and what they need to thrive in the workplace. In 2018, Ralph Wolff and Melanie Booth, then both senior leaders of The Quality Assurance Commons for Higher and Postsecondary Education, asserted how Employer surveys consistently reveal that more than disciplinary knowledge and skills is needed to be successful in today's workplace—regardless of the field, level of education, or level of work and that what have traditionally been called ‘soft skills’ have in fact become essential employability qualities (Wolff & Booth, 2017, p. 52). In other words, you'll need more than technical skills to land that new job, and the soft skills that once were icing on the cake are now undeniably indispensable.

This should give trainers and educators hope. A crystal ball isn't necessary if the actual technical skills needed to succeed are only part of the equation. From my early days teaching social‐emotional skills in elementary school to my recent work teaching the same skills to adults, I've seen firsthand how these valuable life skills can be appropriately taught and reinforced to give learners an incredible advantage toward career and life success.

In this book, we'll dive into what these future‐proof skills are, their demonstrated impact, how to evaluate programming that supports them, and how to integrate these skills and the world of work into your classroom or training center. We'll do this after evaluating the current landscape—and its expected changes—as well as the evolving role of education in preparation for these changes.

There will be naysayers who see the focus on non‐technical aspects of career readiness as a distraction at best or waste of time at worst. This can easily be exacerbated by a school or program's intense focus on external‐mandated academic standards or standardized testing. In a training setting outside of the K–12 system, it can be similarly easy to defer to technical skills first. I've often heard from expert and well‐intentioned program coordinators, We don't have time for that soft stuff—there's too much actual skills content we need to do first.

As real as these attitudes and requirements are, and as aggressive as course syllabi and training curricula can be, educators and trainers must not turn a blind eye to the growing movement and body of research showing just how essential the soft stuff is. The ever‐shifting workplace and our societal understanding of work is different now than it was even 10 years ago. Sticking with just one profession, or even one company, throughout your entire career is no longer common. Even while writing this book, generative Artificial Intelligence (AI) had a breakthrough, bringing even more attention to technology's disruptive innovations in the workplace.

Throughout this book, we will examine the challenges and roadblocks faced by students when determining their career path, as well as challenges faced by the teachers who act as shepherds along their journey. You will have an opportunity to dig into strategies and approaches that work to alleviate these challenges. With so much changing, educators who equip their students with the enduring knowledge, skills, and aptitudes that foster success no matter the circumstances will have tremendous impact on the next generation of job seekers. This book will give you the head start you need to embrace this shift and get started on the work.

First, I will establish a foundational understanding of how the workplace is evolving and why a shift is necessary in how we prepare learners. Then, we'll look at the core knowledge, skills, and aptitudes that give students a universal advantage even for roles that don't yet exist. Finally, we'll dig into resources and strategies to evaluate program effectiveness, bring the world of work into your classroom, and bridge the gap between education and successful employment. Each chapter ends with reflection questions and intentions to support application to your own context.

Throughout the book, Spotlight Stories will highlight strategies in action across various teaching contexts to help make connections to your own professional situation. Because this work is deeply personal to me, I'll also share my own experiences in sections noted as From the Personal Archive. Through these anecdotes and vignettes, I hope to breathe additional life into the experiences, research, and shifts covered throughout the book.

Unfortunately, many people in our society do not respect and honor teachers and their unique and distinct abilities. It seems too often that those who've never taught are the ones with the loudest advice. That's one reason why I wrote this book as a top‐up to the incredible work already being done by educators on the ground, closest to the learners—the ones who live the work every day. I have been where you are and I know how time consuming it is to teach full time, without a single break through the day, all while taking care of mounting personal responsibilities outside of work. To then try to stay up to date with Future of Work research, the jobs landscape, and in‐demand career skills feels like yet another unfair expectation.

As my career evolved, I kept thinking that I was constantly learning things I wished I'd known as a classroom teacher. I saw a gap for teachers and trainers, and I hope this book will help fill this gap—that through it, educators continue to serve as sage advocates for learners with a sharper eye toward preparing for future employment. I want this book to save you the time of synthesizing this for yourself. I aim to provide research‐backed context, heartfelt encouragement, and actionable ideas to shift teaching forward toward meaningful support of student career paths. If any teacher or trainer feels better equipped, through their own actions and choices, to create lifelong learners who are ready to nourish careers that are aligned to their skills and interests, I'll count this text a success.

When you apply these comprehensive principles and strategies, you will help your students achieve personal fulfillment. As with any worthwhile endeavor, transforming your approach and best practices will take time. You'll need to do the work of applying the learnings to your context. However, it will be worthwhile work.

I have faced challenges in my career. Maybe you can relate to some—loads of student debt, limited resources with which to engage learners, the negative social stigma sometimes attributed to George Bernard Shaw that, those who can't do, teach. Yet, to this day, I wake up with a fire to keep going and tackle the newest challenges. I want others to nurture that same fire in educators and trainers. I want to support them so that they can feel the satisfaction that comes from reaching their personal and professional goals. I want to partner with others who are called to make sure that today's learners are ready for the dawn that's breaking tomorrow.

Educators, trainers, administrators, leaders—know that I see you. I see you up late working, spending your own hard‐earned money on your classroom or training program, working tirelessly for your students. Let me help you move forward to scalable and enduring results. It is my sincere hope that through my varied educational experiences, knowledge of the Future of Work across professional sectors, and understanding of cutting‐edge educational practices, you will be able to tweak, augment, and supplement your practice to truly shift your teaching forward.

Reflections and Intentions

Consider your own path to identifying a career. What came easily to you? What roadblocks did you overcome? What supports did you have?

How does your current educational or training program consider the big picture of the lifelong learning and career journey?

Think about one student who faces big challenges identifying or navigating their career path; internally dedicate the time you will spend working through this book to them and their journey.

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The Jobs Landscape Is Changing

Employers estimate that 44% of workers' skills will be disrupted in the next five years. Cognitive skills are reported to be growing importance most quickly, reflecting the increasing importance of complex problem‐solving in the workplace.

—The Future of Jobs Report 2023 by the World Economic Forum

I must admit—it feels quite daunting to hear people talk about the Future of Work. Teachers feel the weight of their students' unknowable futures every time someone quips, It will be here before you know it, or It'll be wildly different than anything we've ever seen before! Future of Work workshops try to lure teachers in with promises of being let into the secrets, although sometimes these promises lack novelty, substance, or both. Educators are left with a riddle to solve—here's an unknown timeline with unknown characteristics, and it's up to you. Better get your students ready!

No one was referring to this phenomenon as the Future of Work