Geoff Mulgan of The Young Foundation puts it well:

“Over the last two decades a gulf has opened up between what education systems provide and what children need. Education systems rightly provide children with skills in numeracy and literacy and academic qualifications. But the emphasis on a set of core academic skills, and a culture of intensive testing, has too often squeezed out another set of skills – how to think creatively, how to collaborate, how to empathise – at the very time when they are needed more than ever”

The need to educate people – adults and children alike – in various aspects of ‘the art of living’ is a theme running through much of my work, and this report (called ‘Grit: The skills for success and how they are grown‘) by The Young Foundation explores some of these skills in greater detail and makes a case for why they matter in our lives.

Although it perhaps focuses more on the benefits of these skills in people’s careers than in life generally (understandable as it needs to be ‘sold’ to policy makers), it contains an interesting overview of topics such as the need for people to be taught to be reslient in facing the adversity and challenges of life.