The Qualification Bubble

We have one of the best Education Systems in the World ! ( Rant!)

Qualification Bubble

To compliment the Irish Property Bubble we have our Qualification Bubble built on the same false premise - rather than everyone becoming rich by investing in property - it is everyone can become rich by acquiring a qualification, a masters or better still a PhD.

The qualification boom moved in unison with the property boom, we built all these new achedemic institutions populated them with fools and then sold qualifications to allcomers.

The double whammy is that the qualified were and are fooled into thinking they are something they are not ..... educated.

The new institutions and courses mushroomed we now have qualifications in every subject, we can hardly go to the bathroom without a qualification and knowledge of "best practice". Qualifications are the new devalued currency suffering from rapid inflation and soon will go bust.

We have populated the Universities with mediocrity, people who have no life experience just book learning. These people are often arrogant and uneducated and hunger after the power privilege and status of being a lecturer.

The rumblings are beginning..... Ireland will soon be found out for having an over qualified and undereducated population.

Civil Society Irish Style - Claim Jumpers

Hi,

Have you heard of the new crowd on the bock - Civil Society Irish Style. Civil Society is now being cornered in Ireland by the NGO's ... the Poverty Industry, the Development / Aid Industry and the Qualifications Business. They now have the answers !

Civil Society in Ireland consists of Family, Church, GAA, Soccer Clubs, Womens Groups, Mens Groups, Card Clubs, Tennis Clubs, Lions Clubs, Gardening clubs etc...... and yet it is now being hijacked by power grabbers the professional NGO's

The NGO's represent vested interests and are interested in protecting their power, their status their income and their privilege. They have pursuits like helping the poor, they come from the colonial imperialist model of behaviour and are of little value to a sane society.

They are professional advocates or self proclaimed representatives of the poor and disadvantaged and their careers are dependant on maintaining the status quo. They are the needy in that they require more than most, they require that feeling associated with do-gooders, that feeling of superiority and privilege that allows them stay in positions of power, positions that perpetuate and are contingent on the dependency culture they profess to eliminate.

The current claim grabbers have taken all the space of Civil Society and claim a purity they do not rightfully possess. They are not Civil Society but impostors and claim grabbers who hunt power status and privilege and lack that essential humility and culture of service.

They are lifers, career helpers and facilitators of dependency who earn their money from the distress of others whom they then claim to represent or act on their behalf as advocats.

We need to look at all the power and privilage hunters and query their motivation and credentials. Why remove one set of power hungry people and replace them with another.

Striving versus Being

Hello,

Ever get caught up with all the stuff going on, Internet, blogs, new gadgets, cars, clothes houses. Do you find it difficult just to switch into observing and being. Ever feel that all the doing, accumulating and achieving is just a cushion, a buffer between us and life.

Perhaps all our striving is just denial, we will do anything , whatever, to avoid the truth. Perhaps life would be a lot more rewarding and less stressful if we could accept.

So what would we accept? Well perhaps we would accept that we are more like the rest of living entities than we care to admit. Perhaps we are no more important and have no different a role that the trees or grass or frogs. We are born we develop, we mate, we nest and nurture. We grow old and we die. In-between we have moments of pleasure and of pain and with most areas of life that we encounter we have far less control than we pretend.

Our life cycle is no different that the life-cycle of a spider or a potato plant, but how we strive and strut to deny this. Sure we have intelligence however we are a very primitive species.

So is this a dismal tale? Well not really. Perhaps if we accept reality we would address the real issues, have real values and stop running away from what we know and fear deep down. Perhaps we would get close to nature, to people and to the planet and enjoy the big things in life that we ignore every day. The sun rising, the clouds passing, the wind blowing all these big things that we have made little.

So what about the rest of life, learning, working, making money, the BUZZ?

Perhaps we have turned life upside down, suffer from addictions and crave acceptance for our achievements and possession's and fail to identify the nourishment we need. Perhaps we need to restore the balance, become aware of what we are doing, realise we have more choice and less control than we admit.

Do we ever stand back and ask what really matters to us, what do we value, what could we not live without, what are our needs.

So where to start?

Perhaps at the beginning and end of each day ask whether you are doing what you really want to do this day. You have one life and each day is for living, just bring some awareness into your life look for you addictions and denials and connect with people and nature.

Have a go, you owe it to yourself.

This is an image of community life painted by a participant in CommunityCafé .ie

Values 2

Just thinking about values in while walking in the park today. I was wondering why we follow the values that are the norm and why we need to have different values held up to us. Why do we need a vision and why are values so important in that vision.

I feel we all seek acceptance and approval and how better to get this than to follow the accepted prevailing values. At the moment a lot of the prevailing values are about growth, achievement and material acquisition.

Before there is a shift to more grounded values we need a vision painted that espouses new values and only when the new values have some social acceptance will a majority of people embrace them. Unfortunately the line people follow like sheep has validity, we need some social acceptability for the values we aspire . We need champions to espouse new values of social cohesion, well-being, equality before they gain widespread acceptance.

We have limited resource of energy, application , time and talent and it is important that these resources are applied to areas that make a difference.

Currently so much human endeavour is whittled away on mindless pursuits ... just look at X-factor , the apprentice Big Brother etc ... they are a fair barometer of the state of our current values.

We need a new vision articulated by you.

Education Stuck in a Rut

Obsolete with an excessive bias towards the academic, slow dull and suitable for another era, this could be a description of our current educational system.

The country or countries to catch up with our kids and adult learners will be the country that will excel. Life has moved on from the current educational model, it is no longer relevant we need to change and move forward to reflect the new world, We then need to foster innovation and creativity in our education system but first we need to catch up.

We have not adjusted to YouTube, Google, face book, Be BO Twitter, Blogs, Internet Marketing,

Can you imagine learning spaces that inspire, link to the outside integrate with the fabric of their village,town or city. Spaces that use form, proportion and colour to energise. Spaces that are filled with light that facilitate creativity and learning.

Classrooms that allow movement, encourage engagement and participation, learning places and learning spaces. Can you imagine a teacher who asks questions, draws out the views of learners, a teacher who is open to learning rather than lecturing.

Knowledge and data are freely available now on the Internet, cramming learners with data is like overfeeding our kids with junk food. We all need to learn the skills of problem solving, research, questioning and this needs to happen in a complete world or planet view context.

Subjects need to become whole and connected rather than separate, subjects like economics need to be learned in a living responding environment, and the impact of economics on communities and the environment included. Our education needs to move from linear thinking to web thinking with the connections receiving as much attention as the individual subjects.

So much to consider and change..... when will we move from our current stodgy rut ?

Values and Needs

Interesting to contemplate what we need in life and what do we value at present. Is there a gap between our needs and our desires and where do both come from.
My desires are probably to a large extent picked up from what is going on around me, what others have or are doing, what is in the environment around me. Over time I think desires change, some with fashion others depending on the norms that I live in.

I feel we have focused almost exclusively on economic growth and development over the past ten to fifteen years to the exclusion of more basic values and needs.
To get our desired economic growth we have paid a large price which has taken a toll on community and family.

We need strong cohesive supportive communities and yet the impact of economic policies on community is seldom considered. If we are serious about the importance of community then we need to assess the impacts of our policies on community cohesion, development and survival.

What does it benefit a society if it gains economic wealth and looses community viability.

The effect of the focus on economic growth has also had an impact on family well being and stability. Is this impact considered in pursuing our economic goals.

Constant economic growth also has a major impact on environment, do we really need all the stuff we clutter our lives with ? more landfill.

We are probably all addicted to growth, and consumption at this stage and feel very hard done by this recession, even those of us who still have more than enough.

Perhaps we need to find our way forward to new values and new structures and new ways of living that will meet our need for family, community and sustainable environment.