Isn’t one of the core purposes of education to increase civic competency? And not just to help us understand the issues, become more connected to our community and our fellow community members, but to develop deep skills like empathy and compassion? So what do we need to learn and what do our young people need to learn if we’re going to solve the challenges ahead? STEM is critical, but there’s so much more we need to know if we’re going to save this world of ours.
So let’s embrace MESH (as any good liberal arts major would have you do). “Forget STEM, We Need MESH“‘s author Tim Wise is speaking truth when he writes
“… without an equal commitment to comprehensive civics education — an examination of subjects that touch on the relationships between people, government, the economy, and media — all the technical know-how in the world will be for naught … For this reason, I would suggest a renewed focus on MESH education, which stands for Media Literacy, Ethics, Sociology, and History. Because if these are not given equal attention, we could end up with incredibly bright and technically proficient people who lack all capacity for democratic citizenship.”
Our communities need us. And we need to know how to help. Keep learning.
