Last night, President Obama delivered an address to the nation.  He focused on the state of the economy and his administration’s plans for the economic future of our country focusing on energy, healthcare, and education.  I thought I would examine his plans for education as it relates to higher education and compare them to the public policy initiatives and thought pieces that have previously been published.

President Obama’s speech led off with a discussion of the global economy and the fact that “the most valuable skill you can sell is your knowledge.”  One of the first persons to stimulate a national discussion on this topic was author Thomas Friedman with the publication of his book, The World is Flat, in 2005.  Friedman cogently makes the point that technology has opened up the ability for companies to effectively employ engineers from India and China while conducting their business from the U.S.  Friedman also discusses the higher rates of education in countries with former third world status where it is recognized that the ticket to financial success is a good education.

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Thomas Friedman is well-known for his book, The World is Flat.  His 2008 work, Hot, Flat, and Crowded: Why We Need a Green Revolution – And How it Can Renew America, is insightful and provocative.  If the global economy and U.S. election were not the two biggest topics in the media, I am certain that Friedman’s latest book would receive more coverage in the press.  Hot, Flat, and Crowded is about the need for a Green Revolution.  More than 400 pages in length, it is not a light read.  If you don’t have time to read a book of this length, seriously consider the CD or MP3 version.  If that’s not an option, borrow the book and read the first and last chapters.

Sometime ago, I wrote about the President’s Climate Commitment initiative.  I stated that I thought it was the right thing to do even though I wasn’t sure that carbon neutrality was achievable in the near term.  Friedman’s premise is that reducing our carbon footprint is the right thing to do for our children and that waiting twenty or thirty more years to start conservation efforts will be too late.

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Nicholas Carr is known to many for his book,
Does IT Matter His new book, The Big Switch, is just as provocative and one that I recommend for stimulating your thinking about many of our businesses today.  Carr provides the reader with a background on the electric industry and its evolution from private company and municipality driven systems to standardized and large public utilities empowering the widespread usage of electrical appliances.  He envisions a similar transformation with computers and cites the widespread influence of “server farms” being established by Google, Microsoft, Dell, Yahoo!,
and IBM.  Carr predicts that computing power and consistency will be as standardized and as inexpensive as electricity at some point in the future.  The prohibitive costs of establishing a business utilizing computers will decline substantially, resulting in the empowerment of individuals to begin, manage, and grow large-scale businesses, capitalizing on their intellectual property.  Monetary capital won’t be the driver, intellectual capital will be.

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