Investing in people here

The Issue: Speaker Benigno R. Fitial urges both public and private sectors to invest in the education of our people.

Our View: The most successful countries the world over share something in common: An educated cadre of workers.

Speaker Benigno R. Fitial’s encouragement that we invest in the education of our people didn’t spin out of a vacuum. It is premised on the observation of how the most successful countries in the world have worked long and hard to educate their people so that most of them are prepared to embrace the challenge of Life After Campus (LAC).

We need not go further than the Land of the Rising Sun (the world’s second most powerful and successful economy) to see how it conquered the global village not with nuclear warheads, but products it manufactured with the most technologically advanced methods of production. Other than Silicon Valley, Japan is the world’s envy for its technological advancement in basically everything that is sold at the global market.

The NMI may never reach the sophistication of Japan’s hi-tech community, but the point so well articulated by Speaker Fitial holds true: Investors critically review the level of education of work forces of investment venues before making a commitment on capital investment. As such, the NMI must seriously review investing in the so-called “new economy” which uses computers and the Internet system in basically all facets of development.

This issue definitely warrants a joint review not only by the Board of Education, but all sectors who have the most at stake in the development of our indigenous human resources. We must review, with an open mind, the need to revamp conventional educational system so that it accommodates new trends in education that makes the use of computers, Internet and other technological advances an integral part of our curriculum.

The task may be monumental and daunting. But we have to address and resolve this matter as quickly as we can. What we do today will determine the ability of our young people to compete with others in job markets that will demand the use of computers and other technological advances in this millennium. We owe it to ourselves, especially our children who await well thought-out decisions in the need to invest in the “new economy”.

The NMI may be a tiny archipelago, but it must move in concert with the rest of the global community in investing a good portion of its resources in the development of its people equipped with new skills in computer technology. It’s all up to us to put our heads together to prepare posterity for new challenges ahead. Si Yuus Maase`!