EDUCATION
Developing our creative side is a way to help humans fight back, says Dr Alex Carter of the University of Cambridge’s Institute of Continuing Education (ICE)
t is broadly agreed the ‘Industrial Revolution 4.0’ is here: we have already seen
the loss of quite a few traditional jobs, such as manufacturing, to robots, so where does this leave us humans? It appears we will be performing the complex ‘thinking’ jobs that cannot be automated. What this means is, in essence, a higher percentage of us than ever before will need to develop flexible and creative thinking to tackle a constantly shifting landscape. I have been developing a series of short courses at ICE to develop precisely the skills that will be in demand in the future: creative and abstract thinking. These courses will cover subjects such as the theory, history and philosophy of creativity, and they are courses aimed at anyone and everyone.
top three increasing skills as analytical thinking and innovation, active learning and creativity, and originality and initiative. The ICE courses will develop all three of these – not only with their content, but also in the way that adult students are taught through ‘active learning’, rather than more traditional ‘chalk and talk’ teaching. Can creativity be developed? While it is generally agreed creativity is not something you can teach, the good news is that, in my experience, a creative mindset is highly developable. It simply takes practice. As a theoretician and teacher, my involvement in developing these skills can only be half of the story. The other half must come from the students themselves. Working in adult education, I am continually impressed by my student’s readiness to develop a flexible mindset and challenge what they think they know. Recently, a student on one of my courses, a retired medic in his 70s, said to me: “I always thought the world was
black and white, but after studying at ICE for two weeks, I’ve come to realise there are shades of grey!” I find it interesting that Steve Jobs, founder of Apple, was fond of saying his success was due to hiring artists and musicians fascinated by technology, rather than computer specialists. I think the imperative now is not simply to find ways of working with AI, we also need to see this as an opportunity for us to grow as human beings. On the other hand, I am not immune to the threat AI poses: teachers have already begun to be replaced with scripted AIs. If I don’t want to find myself writing scripts for robots, I also need to stay agile. This plays no small part in my decision to develop courses in creativity theory and creative practice. Applying creativity to real life An example of the kind of conversations participants in the courses will engage in: students will consider Jackson Pollock’s approach
In demand: people who can destabilise and create anew The World Economic Forum has
recently identified those skills that will, in the near future, “form the competitive edge for any organisation”. Its report, Towards a Reskilling Revolution , lists the
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