Education in America could use a big dose of innovation. How about one public school system for employees, and another for entrepreneurs? Leave your comments at the end!
In the summer of 1932, presidential candidate Franklin Delano Roosevelt promised, “I pledge you, I pledge myself, to a new deal for the American people.”
Today, it is time not for a “New Deal,” but a “New Mission.”
America’s schools need to take a page from the businesses that have been created by entrepreneurs over the past decades. Henry Ford, Bill Gates, Steve Jobs, Sergey Brin and Larry Page have all given us the road map, but the path toward entrepreneurship is often the road less traveled America’s schools.
The U.S. unemployment rate is currently 9.7% in what many call a “jobless recovery.” So what should we do? The problem and the solution can be found in America’s educational system and its current mantra: “Go to school and get good grades, so you can get a good high-paying job.” In simpler terms that means, “Go to school to become a good employee.” But there are too many employees, which is why we have an unemployment problem. Today, kids just out of school aren’t finding jobs. At the same time, many of their parents are going back to school for retraining. But they’re not finding jobs, either.
The idea of a high-paying job for life is truly an American dream — but no longer a reality. With low-priced labor and lower-priced, higher-performance technology, high-paying American jobs will be disappearing at greater speed as they move overseas.
Two-track system
America’s education system needs an injection of innovation — which is just what entrepreneurs do. We need two different public school programs: one for employees and one for entrepreneurs.
The way to train entrepreneurs is almost exactly the opposite of the methods used to train employees. Another common thread about Ford, Gates and Jobs is that they all dropped out of school. This is not to say education is not important, but training entrepreneurs is different from training people to be employees. It is much like the difference between traditional education and the military academy model.
Many of the lessons I drew upon to write my book, Rich Dad, come from the U.S. military academy system.
In 1965, I left a sleepy sugar plantation town of Hilo, Hawaii, and journeyed to Kings Point, N.Y., to attend the U.S. Merchant Marine Academy. With four years at the academy and six years as a Marine Corps pilot, including two trips to Vietnam, I gained many of the real-life skills and character traits I count on today as an entrepreneur.
Success in the military is a great bellwether signaling achievement in business. For example, the Israeli Defense Forces are a breeding ground for education and entrepreneurs, where many serve in units specializing in military technology. At the beginning of 2009, the 63 Israeli companies listed on the Nasdaq, many led by former IDF members, outnumbered those of any other foreign country, according to the book Start-up Nation by Dan Senor and Saul Singer. There are simple lessons here for America’s gridlocked education system.
If I were running America’s schools system, I would create the U.S. Business Academy for Entrepreneurs, modeled after our federal military academies. Admissions would be via congressional appointment along with nominations from community business leaders. The entrance exams would be rigorous; the curriculum would be very different from traditional colleges.
On first day at any of the five federal military academies, each student is required to memorize the academy’s mission. In the military, mission is more important than life. After leaving the Marine Corps and starting my own business, I found many executives with MBA degrees focused only on money. Money was their only mission. If they could cut expenses by firing employees, so be it. This was unconscionable at the academy and the Marine Corps. As military officers, our mission was to serve our country and bring our troops home alive. It was drummed into our souls that our mission was more important than our lives.
The mission of the U.S. Academy for Entrepreneurs would be to create sustainable, well-paying jobs for employees by aggressive growth of the business. Too many executives are trained to grow the business through mergers and acquisitions, using massive amounts of debt. Though this might make shareholders happy, in most cases it rips the soul out of the business, loading it with debt while putting the jobs of employees at risk.
Creating real jobs
If corporate executives cannot grow a business organically, they will often repurchase their shares to make it look as if the share price is going up — again to keep shareholders happy and the CEO employed. This is business manipulation, and not the true mission of a sustainable business. The lesson learned is, a loyal employee is not as important as money.
The U.S. Business Academy for Entrepreneurs would have only real entrepreneurs as teachers. I would ask that they work for only $1 a year (think of the great entrepreneurial CEOs who have turned around their businesses doing the same). You see, if they were real entrepreneurs, they would not need the money. They would teach for the same reason the students are there: the mission to create entrepreneurs who create sustainable jobs for the country.
Whether you agree with me or not, I hope it’s clear that we need to create more entrepreneurs — since only entrepreneurs can create real jobs.
We need to pledge ourselves to this New Mission: job creation by those who are true job creators.
SEARCH ENGINE KEYWORD RESULTS :
I have learned many lessons as a result of reading Robert Kiyosakis books.
These are just a few I would like to share with you. But bare in mind, these principles may throw everything you may have learned out the door.
Lesson #1: Your house is a liability, not an asset.
Lesson #2: Leverage is the reason some people are rich and others do not become rich. And most people do not become rich because they fear the power of leverage. And the most powerful leverage in the world is your MIND.
The poor and middle class have a hard time getting rich because they try to use their own money to get rich. If you want to get rich you have to learn to use others money…not your own.
Lesson #3: Good debt makes you rich, bad debt makes you poor.
Lesson #4: The choice of words you use will make you rich or poor. Words are powerful tools…tools for the brain. It does not take money to make money. “Getting rich begins with your words and words are free.â€
Poor people say ‘I can’t afford it’ more often than rich people. Your words become flesh.â€Poor people use poor words create poor peopleâ€.
Lesson #5: The problem with having a job is that it gets in the way of getting rich.
Lesson #6: The biggest challenge you have is to challenge your own self-doubt and your laziness. If you want to change what you are you must take on your self doubt and your laziness. It is your self doubt and laziness that deny you the life you want,â€. If you will take on your self-doubt and your laziness, you will find the door to your freedom.â€
Lesson #7: It is your “Why†that gives you the power to do the how to. Instead of looking inside of themselves to find a ‘why’ they want to become rich, most people look for the easy road to wealth, and the problem with the easy road is that the easy road usually ends in a dead end.
Lesson #8: Unless someone has a passion for something, it is difficult to accomplish anything. Rich Dad used to say. “If you want something, be passionate. Passion gives energy to your life. Passion gives energy to your life.
Lesson #9: Take at least 1 hour each month to reflect on your life. Taking the time to reflect on Robert Kiyosaki life raised the following ideas.
1. What he thought was important was not that important.
2. What was important was where he was at, not where he was going.
3. There is no one more important than the person in front of you at that moment. Take that moment to be with him or her.
4. Time is precious., dont waste it…appreciate it.
5. Sometimes stopping for a moment is harder than staying busy.
Lesson #10: A high paying job without ‘Financial Education’ often means the person gets deeper in debt faster than someone with a low -paying job. That is not too intelligent.
More:
10 “Retire Young, Retire RICH†Lessons
We are either going into a Depression or Hyperinflation. The Dollar will be coming down and things will get tough.
From : YouTube :: Tag // money
Author: khushiss69 Keywords: Robert Kiyosaki New Rules of Money Part 17 Conventional Education Vs Financial Literacy Added: July 14, 2009
Go here to read the rest:
Robert Kiyosaki New Rules of Money, Part 17 Conventional Education Vs Financial Literacy
By Janet Bodnar
It’s a challenge for adults to create a financial Web site for kids that offers age-appropriate information and is entertaining enough to hold their attention. To mark National Financial Literacy Month, I’d like to mention a few that are worth a look.
For elementary-age kids. Meet the “Centsables” (www.centsables.com). They’re six super-hero friends — named, fittingly, Franklin, Jackson, Grant, Hamilton, Penny and Suzie B. — who live in Centsinnati and can “grow to gargantuan height, run like the wind, and control the elements.” And they do it all in the service of giving kids super money-management skills. Mark DiPippa, president of Norm Hill Entertainment and creator of the project, has ambitious plans to produce it as an animated TV series.
For now, kids can enjoy the Centsables online in a series of games and comic books. The target audience — children ages 6 to 11 — can probably handle the activity pages and comic books on their own. Younger children may need a hand from parents to navigate the lessons, which include “How kids earn money” and “Taking stock of the market.”
For middle- and high-school students. CareerForward is a free, innovative online program developed by the Michigan Department of Education, Michigan Virtual University and Microsoft’s Partners in Learning unit.
The curriculum is designed to take about 20 hours to complete and may be directed by a teacher (Michigan requires all students to have at least one online learning experience before they graduate), a volunteer or an interested parent.
CareerForward isn’t focused exclusively on financial education. But there’s a unit on managing money, including lessons in budgeting and a salary calculator for future jobs.
What I like about the program is that it gets kids thinking about what they’d like to do beyond high school — the education and skills they’ll need to earn a living in the global workplace. And that, after all, will determine how much money they’ll have to manage and what their standard of living will be.
For college students. Though not an interactive Web site per se, the “Playbook for Life” guide may be downloaded or ordered at www.playbook.thehartford.com. Originally developed by The Hartford insurance company in conjunction with the NCAA, the idea was to educate student athletes about the importance of financial planning.
But the lessons are equally valuable for all college students and young adults, with sections on purchasing a house, buying (and maintaining) a car, saving for retirement, buying insurance and paying taxes.
And when your kids are ready to go out on their own, there’s a lot of useful information at Kiplinger.com in the Starting Out section.
Read more here:
Sites That Foster Good Money Skills
