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Educated, digital Europe will find the answers

Helping imbue youth with a range of ideas and exposure to other cultures has long been a goal of enlightened societies.

At a meeting in Rome last year, Europe's leaders reaffirmed their commitment to a "union where young people receive the best education and training to find jobs across the continent".  With divisive and even fake news proliferating online, educators and political leaders alike see the overarching need for critical thinking and literacy, skills they see as crucial to professional development and life itself in the modern world.
Populism and xenophobia fueled by misinformation and intolerance can drive a wedge between peoples in a world that -  like it or not - grows ever closer.
Helping imbue youth with a range of ideas and exposure to other cultures has long been a goal of enlightened societies. Student exchange programmes and even international pen-pal programmes helped in the past. Today the options are more robust.
The Erasmus initiative in particular stands out, says Professor Francesco Profumo, former Italian Minister of Education, Universities and Research. Started in 1987 as a six-year EU pilot project for university student exchange, it proved such a success that by 2013 it had matriculated three million students. A further four million are expected to enroll by 2020.
"It is proven that students who took part in the Erasmus programme had less difficulty finding and keeping a job, even during the worst years of the great recession from 2008 to 2011," he says. "The Erasmus model has also been adopted by some high schools. In this case the results are very positive, as well."
But students who never get that far are at greatest risk. Early leavers from training and the low-educated youth face particularly severe problems in the labour market. According to statistics agency Eurostat, about 58 per cent of 18 to 24 year olds in the EU with only lower secondary education and not in further education were unemployed in 2016.
Education also plays a crucial role in tackling the challenges of an aging population. Tomorrow's workforce will face continued digitalisation and possible retraining for needed skills. To help filter an increasing complex world, critical thinking and media literacy are needed in success at work, and perhaps more importantly, for life in general.
A new study by the Pearson education assessment service in partnership with Nesta and the Oxford Martin School examined the jobs and skills most likely to be in demand by 2030. The report suggests that in the face of automation, just one in 10 are "highly likely" to experience a rise in demand for their job.
"The report finds that work performance in its quantitative and qualitative aspects is not just a function of technological change, but is influenced by a set of variables such as environmental sustainability, urbanisation, globalisation, demographic change, increasing inequality and political uncertainty," says Profumo.
But in many ways it's back to the future. "Old" skills are what's needed to sort and evaluate an ever-more complicated workplace and world.
The study found high-order cognitive skills such as originality, fluency of ideas and active learning together with active listening, judgment and decision making to be crucial. Social skills are branded "the key to success as demand for uniquely human skills rises".
 "I think the future will require higher levels of education compared to the past for the types of jobs that don't yet exist. We must prepare those kids," he says. "My advice to them is to study, study and again study! Most likely, citizens will have to go back to school several times in life (it is said five times), a continuing education to stay up-to-date and prevent their knowledge and skills from becoming obsolete."
But with some questionable political leaders appealing directly to regionalism and fear using social media, education and people-to-people exchanges might be most needed to help fight irrational populism and xenophobia.
"Education is the best antidote to populism and xenophobia. School is the place where tomorrow's citizens are formed," says Profumo. "For these reasons investment in education and training is a priority for our European countries. That's the most profitable investment, not only immediately but certainly in the medium and long term."
Mariella Radaelli and Jon Van Housen are editors at the Luminosity Italia news agency in Milan