Author: José Picardo

Supporting schools, educators, and organisations to lead with clarity, teach with impact, and grow with purpose

José Picardo

Back in 2012, following the launch of one of the very first 1‑to‑1 tablet programmes in a UK school, a parent approached me at the Open Morning event and said, “I love the way you’re preparing children for the future.” I smiled and replied, “I’m not sure we’re doing that. We’re just preparing them for the present.”

It wasn’t a prepared response, and I didn’t mean to be facetious. I’ve just never thought it wise to plan other people’s futures for them, especially when it comes to children. I’ve always been cautious about projecting my biases onto any prediction. After all, when you’re a hammer, every problem looks like a nail.

That’s why I’ve remained healthily sceptical of concepts like “21st‑century skills”, which often turn out, when scrutinised, to be perfectly timeless ones: communication, problem-solving, curiosity. The sort of skill Cicero might have recognised. In any century, not just the 21st. You see, I’d rather we focus on teaching students what we know today, equipping them with the clarity, confidence and literacy they need to become the architects of their own tomorrow, not the future some old teacher (me!) can imagine for them.

Supporting schools, educators, and organisations to lead with clarity, teach with impact, and grow with purpose

José Picardo

I’m not sure I subscribe to the notion that history always repeats itself, but it certainly seems to have a rhythm.

I’m (perhaps clearly) not a historian, but it is the case that throughout the ages, great technological leaps have brought not only progress, but also destabilisation. Gutenberg’s press democratised knowledge, but it also catalysed the Reformation and decades of sectarian conflict. The sailing innovations of the Spanish and Portuguese unlocked new worlds, but also ushered in centuries of colonisation and enslavement. The steam engine transformed economies and lifted millions out of agrarian poverty, while simultaneously igniting class strife and feeding the greed of new empires, the consequences of which still shape countries around the world, quite literally.

Supporting schools, educators, and organisations to lead with clarity, teach with impact, and grow with purpose

José Picardo

In geopolitics, it’s often said that generals are always preparing to fight the last war. One of the most infamous examples was the Maginot line in Eastern France: a vast line of fortifications built after World War I to prevent another German invasion of France from the most obvious direction. The only problem was that France built this fortification with the last war in mind, not the next. Germany simply went around it, invading via the Netherlands instead.

Much of our educational strategy risks resembling the same kind of static defence: we design policies to hold back yesterday’s threats, while today confronts us with goalposts that are constantly shifting. Many schools, especially those in which the once solid pillar of tradition no longer bears weight, struggle to read the runes of change. But change is coming. To paraphrase William Gibson, perhaps it’s already here, just not evenly distributed. Unless we accept this uncertainly and ready ourselves to grapple with its implications, we may find ourselves blindsided by crises we didn’t imagine but could have anticipated.

Here are five “wars” I believe we’re not yet seeing clearly enough, but which are already gathering momentum.