Have you heard that we now have more than seven billion people living on earth? On Monday, 31 October, just before midnight in the Philippines a baby was born, Danica May Camacho, who became the official seven billionth person born.
In 2000 the population on earth was 6 billion people. How extraordinary to think that it took 123 years for the world's population to go from one billion to two billion but only 12 years to grow from six billion to seven billion? The world’s population increases exponentially every year with 2.3 billion people expected to be born in the next 40 years - around 200,000 babies born every day. The planet is expected to hit 10 billion by 2083.
While there was a cheer at the birth of seven billionth baby, there were others who pointed to the world of contradiction in which we live. A world where according to UN chief Ban Ki-moon, we need to tackle inequality on a planet where almost a billion people go hungry while others have surplus food. A world where a small minority live in the lap of luxury with a lavish lifestyle, while billions live in poverty. The gap between the rich and poor widens by an ever increasing scale, despite the commitment of world governments to reduce the gap at every international summit held by the United Nations over the last twenty years.
By 2030 India will have overtaken China as the most populous country on earth. South Asia has six of the top ten of the world’s fastest growing megacities and the other four are in Asia or in Africa. The Chinese economy has just overtaken Japan as the world’s second largest economy, measured by Gross Domestic Product (GDP is a measure of total production of a country) behind the U.S. economy, which is ranked number one in the world. Some forecasters predict that China’s GDP may almost double that of the U.S. by 2030.
Demographically, the world is changing significantly. In 1950, Europe represented nearly a quarter of the world's total population. A century later it looks set to only make up five per cent. While Asia has more than half of the world's people, its share will only rise slightly from 55.6 per cent to 57.1 by 2150. The real growth, however; is in Africa, where high birth rates and falling levels of infant mortality mean that by 2150 one in four people will be African - up from less than one in 10 in 1950.
Can you imagine listening to seven billion stories? Probably not and yet the reality is that while the total number of people is growing faster than we probably like or care to think about, each person on earth is unique. Each person has his or her own story. When we consider the implications of these statistics, it brings new meaning to the concept of a ‘rapidly changing world’. Yes, there is no denying that the whole global landscape is changing - demographically, economically and environmentally.
How do we prepare young people for this tremendous growth and change in the world? Individually and as a country we can no longer hide from the rest of the world. We can no longer ignore the rapid changes that are going on around us. ‘No man is an island’, as John Donne famously penned in 1624:
“No man is an island entire of itself; every man
is a piece of the continent, a part of the main;
if a clod be washed away by the sea, Europe
is the less, as well as if a promontory were, as
well as a manor of thy friends or of thine
own were; any man's death diminishes me,
because I am involved in mankind.
And therefore never send to know for whom
the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. “
(Meditation XVII)
As a school, teachers prepare our young people for an ever changing world. While knowledge is important, it is no longer the single measure of a students’ understanding of the world in which they live. Young people need a vast array of skills – such as traditional skills of reading, writing, technological literacies and numeracy – while at the same time developing deeper understanding, or wisdom, good judgement and emotional intelligences. Students need higher order thinking skills that allow them to discriminate between pieces of information, the ability to analyse, synthesise, extrapolate, interpolate and the capacity to put all of their understanding together in a way that is coherent and comprehensible to themselves and others.
As a parent you understand how important these skills, knowledge and understanding is for your son or daughter’s future. As a school we take this task very seriously and teachers are constantly working to develop these skills in all of our students.
Yes, we have differentiation within our classes. One size does not fit all – some students need extension in particular subjects or skills, other students need support and more time to develop the necessary skills. It is for this reason that the school provides a myriad of in class and out of class extension and support throughout the year:
• Gifted and talented extension through in class activities, competitions like the SEQ Water Wise project, like the Writers Competition, like the Forensic Science investigations, like the special tournaments that challenge students to think ‘outside the box’. We provide each semester the opportunity for any student from Prep to Year 12 to undertake a special project of his or her own choosing for the Excellence Forums held at the School.
• In the classroom each student is challenged beyond their ability and where additional support is needed, it is provided.
• Senior students have the opportunity to commence university study from Year 10 and 11 and other students have the option of undertaking Vocational Education, School-based Traineeships – all before they leave School.
• Opportunity for greater cultural understanding through Exchange to Canada, Scotland or Japan and the increase in international students attending CCPS better prepares young people for this demographic and cultural shift.
The main reason for sharing these options with parents, is to underline the point that in order to better prepare our young people, we have to provide them with the best possible learning opportunities – not as a ‘one off’ but each and every day throughout their entire school life.
The world of the future as Hedley Beare wrote, in 2001, is going to be very different from ours.
In his first chapter he writes of a fictional child:
“Hullo. I am Angelica. I am 5 years old. I really don’t have much of a past. In fact, I am the future…..My world is already very different from the one you have grown up in.”
It is this very unknown and uncertain future for which we prepare our young people. By 2024 our Preps will be leaving our school and embarking on further study at university or the first of many career choices. One thing parents can be confident about, is the level of care and excellence that we will provide for your son or daughter at Caloundra City Private School over the coming years.
Who knows, one of our graduates of the future may be one of the leaders to make significant change for the better in this ever growing world community, which in an almost contradictory way, despite its every increasing size, shrinks in real time of travel and transference of knowledge and goods over time from one country to another. Yes, anything is possible with the right preparation and the wherewithal to make a difference in this world.
Karon Graham
Principal
