Systems Science: Escape From the Education Quagmire?


Education Is Stuck: Is It a Quagmire

         According to Dictionary.com a quagmire is: "2. a situation from which extrication is very difficult." It may be safe to say that many people in higher education, indeed education in general, are feeling like we are caught in a quagmire. We struggle mightily to extricate ourselves from the bog of increasing demands and diminishing returns. Allow us to explain what we mean.

         The purposes of education are: 1) prepare students for their productive lives in society, 2) enrich the lives of students through expanded knowledge and awareness, and 3) prepare students to take up the mantle of citizenship. Any educational institution that adopts the fulfillment of these purposes as their mission is certainly well-intentioned, and most institutions, indeed, do put these purposes at the core of their mission statements. But, lets examine the outcomes of education with respect to these purposes. With respect to purpose number one we generally tend to assume that students, especially in professional degree programs, are getting the knowledge, skills, and competencies necessary to become productive in the workplace. But ask employers if they feel society is getting its money's worth in this account. Most of the professional schools are under intense pressure to do more, both in terms of so-called "hard" knowledge/skills, the explicit content of the profession, and in terms of "soft" knowledge/skills, the implicit content such as how to work in teams, or communications competency. There is a growing concern in the United States that not enough is being done to prepare an adequate workforce, primarily in the technical professions, and especially to compete in the global economy. This translates into both numbers (volume) and quality. We try harder to produce competent graduates, but the sentiment is growing that we are failing to produce acceptable results. Commerce clamors for accountability; for-profit managers think in terms of quantifiable bottom-line results. Politicians in state houses are responding with questions of their own. Higher education has become the focus of attention in this regard, but professors, in turn, point at the secondary education system, complaining that they get students who are not adequately prepared. In many state universities and community colleges the most subscribed math course is remedial algebra, lending some credence to professors' complaints. Furthermore, students' poor attitudes toward learning are cited as major stumbling blocks for successful accomplishment in higher education. And then the high school teachers turn 180 degrees to point at primary education for sending them kids with bad attitudes. And everyone blames parents for not being "involved" in their childrens' education. Parents blame the politicians so their questions become more probing and their frenetic search for a solution leads to programs like No Child Left Behind. While the scope of this piece does not include the analysis of this claim, we nevertheless assert that what we have just described is a gigantic negative feedback loop with that last stage effectively making the problem worse.

         What about the second listed purpose? Here it is becoming increasingly hard to verify any demonstrable level of enrichment. Students in professional programs are required to take some minimum number of general studies courses for breadth and they generally do take just the minimum. Those courses tend to be delivered from siloed departments as service to the university. They are subject-oriented rather than contextualized in a larger picture of society and nature, in time and space. Western civilization history may have points of interest but is largely irrelevant (as usually taught) to most students since it has virtually no identifiable impact on their lives, and especially on their professional interests. Math is mostly to be memorized sufficiently to regurgitate on exams and then promptly forgotten (unless you are in a technical or scientific field). Even purported liberal studies majors are composed of otherwise fragmented pieces of subjects cobbled together by students to form some kind of pattern. For students who naturally take to extracting patterns and meaning from bits and pieces this is an excellent challenge. But how many students can do this on their own?

         And what evidence from the general population of graduates do we have to suggest that the general education made a difference? How enriched did the majority of these students become? How many computer programmers actively support the arts in their community? How many dentists go to public lectures on cosmology? Does anyone know?

         And then what about number three? Is there any strong argument to support a claim that democracy is working really well in this country? Is the political process the best it can be? Are we, as a country, making generally good policy decisions, especially on issues involving science and technology? Is the "debate" over human-induced global warming evidence of how education has prepared our citizens to participate in such policy decisions? Does the average college graduate understand enough about science or even the process of science to separate the ideology from the facts?

         If education were doing such a great job, wouldn't our social situation, our governance institutions, our sense of equity and general moral attitudes, our wisdom as a people be very different from what we actually see? If we were to be giving education a grade based on outcomes and results in terms of the above three purposes, we would probably give it a C- or D+. We are muddling through on number one, but slacking on two and three.

         Our society, indeed the whole world, is now faced with several very difficult and threatening global issues that demand the fulfillment of the purposes of education. Especially important is that every citizen be prepared to contribute to the policy debates that hinge on an understanding of the scientific and technical problems involved. This does not mean that every citizen must be a scientist or engineer. But it does mean that every citizen must have a deeper and broader understanding of the qualitative nature of the world and their place in it. They must also appreciate the way science works, not to become uncritical acceptors of scientists' claims, but to at least understand how those claims came about. Citizens should be able to assess the reality of something like the viability of a hydrogen economy or the hydrogen fuel cell car when the President of the United States pronounces the intention to spend $1.2 billion on R & D to target having this vehicle in production within 15 years. There was no public discourse on this proposal prior to the State of the Union Address (2006). Politicians did not poll their constituencies to determine if they understood the technical risks involved in launching such an effort when the scientific and technical issues were so poorly resolved (most experts do not expect a viable hydrogen economy potential for at least another 20-50 years.) Where did the policy decision come from? And how are the American people supposed to know if it is reasonable or not? We believe a truly educated populace would be able to assess questions like these. That this does not, in fact, happen, that people are not, in general, capable of participating in such discourse, is for us evidence that education is failing to deliver on its purposes.

         We are not alone. There is a growing sentiment that something is terribly wrong with the education system in this country. There are increasingly boisterous demands for improvement. No Child Left Behind, while probably terribly flawed in terms of its unintended consequences for pedagogy, is at least an attempt to find some kind of solution.

         But what makes this problem a quagmire is the ceaseless diminishment of resources applied to "fixing" the education system. Especially for state public institutions at all levels, the amount of state funding is eroding everywhere even while the demands for more education per student is going up. The world is becoming more complex and more education is needed to cope. Whereas in the 1950s a high school diploma served reasonably well for getting a good paying blue collar job, today one needs a minimum two-year (associates) degree for what blue collar jobs remain in the US. A four-year degree is preferred. For professional jobs, a four-year degree is the minimum and graduate work is encouraged. Even within degree programs the pressure to add new subjects is driven by the rapidly changing technology that drives the evolution of our economy. Most professional degree programs have been undergoing continuous evolution as the world around demands new knowledge and new skills be included to meet purpose number one. Moreover, new professions are constantly emerging requiring a divvying up of the shrinking funding pie. How many schools of hotel management were in operation in 1950?

         We do not think we are overstating the case that education is falling behind and that if we just keep doing the same kinds of things we have done in the past, rearranging curriculum but keeping the same school/siloed discipline approach) we will remain stuck in this quagmire and might even find ourselves in some quicksand.

Systems Science: Extricating From the Quagmire

A New Approach to Fulfilling the Purposes of Education

         Are we doomed? We don't think we need to be. But we do think the solution is going to require rather different thinking. We submit that new thinking should start with re-examining the purposes of education in light of how the modern world actually works and in light of knowledge that we have worked hard for and should apply to the very nature of education. This knowledge revolves around two foci, knowledge of human psychology, especially evolutionary neuropsychology and learning, and the nature of knowledge itself. Specifically, we need to look at the organization of knowledge as a system (to be defined below). The intent of education is to imbue the student with a sense of understanding the larger picture while providing them with the tools (for life) to learn specifics relevant to their undertakings. They need also to have enough understanding of specifics in other areas of knowledge, outside their profession, so that they can productively participate in a democratic process.

         We do not wish to imply that there is some magic bullet that will fix everything, but we do want to claim that there is a cognitive framework that, when made explicit, will provide the intellectual and even spiritual (meaning self-actualizing) scaffolding for successfully constructing a life. The framework is systems thinking. The claim is that a systems approach to education and an explicit grounding in systems science (where 'science' means organized knowledge and its discovery) as the fundamental content of education will produce the results we desire from the stated purposes above. Education can fulfill its promise if it works to structure knowledge in accordance with how the world actually works and matches its pedagogy with how human beings actually learn. The starting point for this endeavor is explicating systems science and its role in general education.

Systemness

         The most fundamental aspect of organization in nature is that of systemness. The human brain is evolved to reflect this simple fact. We organize knowledge systemically. Our encoded knowledge forms systems of thought. We learn new knowledge when we can relate the information we receive to what we already know. We use that information to modify or adapt our system of knowledge in varying degrees. But that prior knowledge always acts as a framework for learning. We are attuned to systemness.

         Even with no precise definition of "system," we readily recognize the beast when we run into it. With a little reflection, we realize that the term can apply to virtually everything we do run into. There are physical systems, biosystems, ecosystems, social systems, economic systems, global systems, local systems, gambling systems, computer systems and the list is seemingly endless. All of these systems are composed of subsystems, which in turn, may be analyzed into their own subsystems. Within the academic world, every discipline devotes itself to a specialized systemic understanding, and the object of systemic investigation is itself a system of some sort.

         So what if there were a science of systems as such, i.e. not this kind of system or that kind of system (physics, chemistry, biology, sociology etc.), but of general and useful attributes, characteristics, and behaviors of systems as systems — with room perhaps for some subclassifications such as linear, non-linear, closed, open, complex etc. If one could understand systems or "systemness" this way, one would be understanding features that run through every area of study, primed to look for their particular mode of manifestation on different levels and in different types of system. For this reason those engaged in elaborating just such a science frequently refer to it as a meta-science, one that engages questions relevant at once to every area of disciplined investigation.

         Feeding from the convergence of cybernetics, computers, and information theory on the one hand and ecology and its acolyte physical and life sciences on the other, such systems science has indeed made major strides in the past 4 decades. A Google search on "whole systems" yields 210 million entries, and a quick look at even a few will reveal an extensive, diverse, and lively literature exploring a wide range of applications. A search on "systems science", a more narrow topic, still produces 905,000 hits, of which the top 20+ refer to formal systems science and education venues. Scholars come to this study from the most diverse areas, so one can find rich mathematical explorations, a wide range of exploratory computer simulations, side by side with theological musings on the implications of Steven Hawking’s cosmology, holistic and naturalistic philosophers engaged with earth as a whole (living) system, and ecological thinkers exploring the applicability of their systems understanding to culture and society.

         As diverse as the paths leading into whole systems may be, one common theme that emerges time and again is that this study offers a challenging "paradigm shift" for the whole endeavor of education. The title of a current doctoral thesis is typical: Whole Systems Thinking as a Basis for Paradigm Change in Education: Explorations in the Context of Sustainability (www.bath.ac.uk/cree/sterling.htm). What is typical here goes beyond the simple notion that for the future we will need to learn a new way of thinking and analyzing; the further promise is that this has immense practical and social applications. Sustainability, the mutual fit of human and non-human systems, is perhaps the archetype of the urgent, boundary-defying questions that not only invite, but demand this kind of approach.

         Systems science is the study of systemness. As systemness is a meta-architecture, systems science is a meta-science — a science of how to understand the contents of the disciplines. It is not restricted to the traditional sciences, such as physics or biology. It also applies to disciplines in the humanities, social sciences, and professions. In effect, systems science is the new liberal studies in that it provides a holistic framework for understanding the internal structure and organization of any one discipline, providing the critical thinking skills needed to grasp the important elements of that discipline. All disciplines are the study of the important relationships between objects and concepts within the domain of their interest. All disciplines concern themselves with issues at the boundaries and interfaces with other disciplines. Systems science looks at these issues in a unifying framework such that it is possible to recognize the systemic organization both of objects of study and the discipline itself as an object/system.

         Such a unifying framework is a natural basis for a general education. First, knowledge of systemness and all that is inherent in general systems theory, allows one to navigate within any discipline domain by virtue of understanding the commonalities of the knowledge architecture. In other words, one has the capacity to use systems knowledge to grasp the kinds of objects and relations that are special to the specific domain because they obey systems laws (see below). This means that systems science is a universal preparation for most (and we would argue, all) other disciplines. Since systems science makes the internal organization of disciplines explicit, one is better prepared to efficiently learn the specifics of the discipline. The road map is already laid out, it is just a matter of putting in the sign posts and landmarks.

         Second, knowledge of systems science applied to one domain makes it easier to see how to apply it to other domains. Someone who has successfully mastered one discipline via the application of systems science as a navigation (finding one's way in the field) and a scaffolding (having pre-defined places to hang new knowledge) tool will be able to do so in a new domain. This implies life-long learning, allowing individuals to pursue their interests wherever they may take them, and support for career changes if needed.

Benefits of Learning Systems Science

         One of the attributes of systems science that makes it so attractive as a general studies core is the fact that one must use systems (knowledge and understanding of) from multiple disciplines as examples and thus, the students are necessarily exposed to the breadth of knowledge ordinarily afforded by a traditional liberal studies approach. The significant difference between liberal studies and systems science is that the curriculum in the liberal studies approach is generally offered in discrete, siloed (discipline-specific) courses with interdisciplinary linkages made weakly if at all. A few institutions are experimenting with transdisciplinary approaches, having teams of disciplinary specialists produce large blocks of integrated curriculum. Generally these are still circumscribed by a domain (e.g., sustainability in economics and social science) that provides natural cohesion and a sufficiently common lexicon that allows cross-disciplinary discourse. For example, ecological economics covers issues of sustainability within the framework of traditional economics but expands the domain to include ecology in terms of the natural capital concept (forests replenish O2 and remove CO2 from the air). It also includes social psychology issues, such as individuals mutually reinforcing the drive to conspicuously consume. Thus the topic is broad and requires inputs from several different disciplines, yet is cohesive in that all of these subjects are used to discover better understanding of the whole.

         Where this has been tried at the level of baccalaureate education it has had mixed success. On the one hand many students seem to retain their knowledge better over time because (it is asserted) what they learn is contextualized more broadly and hence more relevant. On the other hand, some students feel they are not getting the kind of education they were expecting, given the pattern of schooling they had experienced previously and the expectation of learning something that would lead to a job. It is uncertain that this attitude could be diminished by appropriate orientation before commencing studies. We will address the issue more thoroughly below when discussing community outreach and how degree programs might be presented to the public. There will definitely be a need to educate the public on the efficacy of a program in systems science since it does not comport with current specialized or career-oriented degree programs. It is a question of name recognition and content relevance.

         Learning systems science is different from learning conventional interdisciplinary or transdisciplinary subjects. It means learning the explicit principles of systems organization as applied to various representative domains along with the content of those domains. The systemness inherent in subjects such as sociology and chemistry can be used to clarify these principles. The student who will not be majoring in sociology or chemistry will have, nevertheless, been exposed to these subjects, and, as importantly, discovered their interconnections on the surface, e.g., the brain chemistry of drugs, the development of dependencies, and the impact on society, as well as the deeper significance of systems principles applied, e.g., the interactions between one system, the brain, and the embedding super-system, society, mediated by the flow of chemical compounds not found in nature. In other words learning is going on at two levels concurrently. The student will learn facts and relations operative in the domain of knowledge of subjects while also learning the deeper patterns of organization and dynamics that unify our ability to understand all such domains.

         Having a significant grounding in systems science provides one with several advantages in terms of future learning. For one it provides a fundamental scaffold for constructing explicit knowledge in any domain. It is, itself, a form of both implicit and explicit knowledge that is relevant in any field. For example, concept maps, which can be constructed in any academic domain, are themselves based on the systems science of network theory. That, in turn, relies on the mathematical tools of graph theory, which provides a rigorous basis for analyzing the efficacy, correctness, and completeness of networks. Concept maps are networks of knowledge chunks and have been used to help students monitor their own learning (called meta-cognition), increasing both the retention of specific knowledge, but also helping establish understanding of the relevance of all chunks relative to one another. Concept maps can be used qualitatively, without recourse to the more rigorous use of graph theory but where the latter is used, the learner can develop a greater level of confidence that her concept map, generated from her personal reflection, is a reasonably valid representation of her knowledge in the domain.

         The development, analysis, and use of concept maps is an explicit application of systems science to learning. Learning to develop and use these maps is learning to learn. A major overall objective of higher education is to prepare students to learn throughout their lives. Learning systems science directly supports this objective.

         Systems science contributes to life-long learning in another way. Knowledge of systemness provides a universal scaffold into which new constructs may be inserted more efficiently. Learners who have a basic framework for learning a new subject are much more successful in efficiently identifying the knowledge they need and incorporating it into their evolving mental models. In the modern world, it is highly likely that the average citizen will change careers, not once, but several times in their life. Having a universally applicable framework for how knowledge is constructed means that one can transfer knowledge and skills as well as incorporate domain-specific facts and relations more quickly. For example it is completely reasonable for a computer scientist who understands information processing to rapidly grasp principles of information as it applies to nervous systems. More generally, information theory is applicable in all fields of study in one form or another. The principles of information theory apply across all of these domains, even if the specific form of information varies in a domain-specific way. Information, communications, and cybernetic theories are key conceptual frameworks in systems science that are completely transferable from one knowledge domain to another with minimal effort.

         Similarly, dynamics, emergence, and evolution, especially co-evolution contain underlying principles, which are universally applicable even if in different guises. All of these aspects of systems science may be studied both qualitatively and quantitatively. That is there are ways to relate all aspects of systems science such that non-mathematically inclined individuals will still grasp the core ideas and relevancies and be able to apply them to the study of non-mathematical subjects. At the same time, all of these aspects enjoy a history of mathematical development that permits those who seek this form of understanding to pursue mathematically rigorous analysis and design. The qualitative aspects of systems science are suitable for a bachelor of arts degree, while the quantitative aspects suggest a bachelor of science degree. The former might be viewed as preparatory for work in humanities and non-quantitative professions. The latter may be oriented toward the mathematically-based sciences and engineering.

Systems Thinking and Learning

         The study of systems science establishes a style of thinking that is applicable in any field or endeavor relevant to one's choice of vocation. But it also prepares one for continual learning throughout life as well as helps one orient appropriately to the political and economic world around them. A systems approach to knowledge acquisition and organization positions one to assimilate understanding of a wide array of subjects. Simple things like looking at the networking of objects in a domain of interest, or the dynamics of those objects' interactions, and being aware of the systems concepts that operate universally allow one to quickly grasp the essences of that domain.

         In other words, having a scaffolding in place that has universal applicability increases both the efficiency of learning new subjects as well as the retention, accessibility, and applicability of that knowledge.

How People Learn

         People learn when their brains assimilate information and construct neural network-based representations of that information. Such representations need to have several important qualities, such as stability, flexibility (modifiability with new information), accessibility (recall), and applicability (usefulness in some relevant context). The brain is most successful in this assimilation/construction task when the individual is motivated. One can quickly learn the colorings of a dangerous snake if one feels threatened. What is more difficult is to become motivated to learn seemingly isolated abstractions with little or no context other than an authority's claim that you should learn this! Current pedgogical theory seems to rely on things like fear (of failure) or entertainment to motivate students. Indeed, teachers are often extolled to "motivate" their students by various carrot and stick methods. What is completely missed in this concept of education is that humans are natural learners that bring their own motivations to the task. What naturally motivates someone to learn is not tricks, especially when they later feel like what they were cajolled into learning has no recognizable relevance to them. What motivates people depends on age and what has already been learned, but in general everyone needs to have a sense that the topic has meaning for them.

         Young children think everything is about them! They are eager to learn anything a relevant adult points to. We know from studies of language acquisition, for example, that the young brain is literally programmed to absorb everything it can. However, it is not able to make fine discriminations or handle nuance. Young children tend to over-generalize as they try to make sense of the world. Nevertheless, their motivation is from an internal drive to start organizing the conceptual framework of life. You can't prevent young kids from learning.

         On the other hand, schools are capable of preventing, or rather killing, the desire of kids to learn. Sometime around the 5th or 6th grade (age 10 to 11, and somewhat different for girls and boys) children start to figure out that they are being expected to memorize facts and isolated relations that too often don't have much relevance to them. Even when they believe their teachers, that they should learn something because they will need it someday, when that someday never seems to arrive, they quickly realize that it is just a game. The survivors do what they are told; they stuff the facts and relations into short-term memory and reherse it often enough to have it accessible for the final exam. Of course some of what they learn sticks, especially if it actually does end up being relevant in due time. Such is the fate of explicit knowledge. Some sticks, most doesn't. A lot depends on the general intelligence aspect of memory and recall capacity, which varies from child to child.

         What explicit knowledge does get learned, and effort expended to extract, organize and assimilate/construct, is that which the student can clearly relate to. Boys (and sometimes girls too) will learn all of the intricacies of the latest video games in a few hours (minutes even) after spending intense mental effort on trying to master the moves and remember all of the logic pathways through the game. They have no problem relating to the story lines (frequently fanatsies or science fiction). They have fun being interactive with the characters and exercising the power that that magnificent huge sword gives them. Learning these games is not easy as any much more mature adult can tell you, yet kids seem to master them almost routinely. In fact, this example is a good one for the arguments for systems science in education. All video games have several aspects in common. The rules of action selection are somewhat easily induced from playing a small number of similar games (games are categorized based on the perspective of the player, e.g. first-person shooter or role-playing, and the kind of "story"). Once learned, the gaming framework, which is a system, is readily transferable to all other games.

         As far as formal school knowledge is concerned, quiz a kid about what they learned in world history two days ago and you will get a response something like, "Oh, not much." But quiz them about what they learned in a class discussion about the war in Iraq and they will virtually gush. This doesn't mean they are learning correct knowledge (especially about inherently controversial topics). But the point is not that they learned facts; the point is that they learned eagerly because the whole environment in society today is pregnant with a variety of emotions due to the context of war. What is the difference between a war fought in the 13th century and one that is being fought today?

         We now know that different regions of the brain mature at different points in the life cycle. The frontal lobes, for instance, don't complete the myelination of axon fibers until late teen and early adult ages. The implications are that some of the executive functions (attention, mental effort, judgment) that have a role in managing working memory have not yet reached their full effect. Myelin sheathing on axons acts as an insulator that increases conduction speeds of action potentials. It isn't known yet what the full implications of this late maturing are with respect to learning (either with respect to the kind of knowledge or the efficiency of assimilation) but we do know that improvements in judgment and impulse control correlate with the myelination. Judgment is involved in deciding what to attend to, what to learn and how much effort to expend in doing so.

         The take-home lesson in this research is that we need to pay close attention to developmental stages in the brain in terms of what can be learned and when it can be learned. We should pay close attention not only to the explicit knowledge itself, its content, but also the relationships between elements in that knowledge that students need to grasp. A key question is at what stage in a child's, an adolescent's, a young adult's, or even an older adult's development should we introduce various kinds of explicit knowledge. Moreover, we should ask how the knowledge itself is relevant to the person. Both the motivation (at that stage of life) and the contextual arrangement of the knowledge need to be considered.

         On this last point, and given the systems approach to knowledge structure, we argue that the subject-based division of knowledge into discrete packages is the worst way to present it at all stages of life. People, young and old alike, find it easy to learn just about anything that they can relate to. This implies finding connections between subjects and everyday life. That is, finding the linkages between subject matter and what is most meaningful to people in their social and economic lives. For young children this starts with subjects that affect them directly. Natural history, for example, captures the imagination of children. Who knows a six year old who isn't fascinated with dinosaurs? They seem to be few in number.

         Every human being is deeply concerned with questions about self identity and how they relate to their social environment. We are wired to care. But rarely do we acknowledge this motivation by focusing studies on how thinking is accomplished by the brain or how people feel about the world and themselves.

         If we recognize a single simple fact from systems thinking it is that every brain is connected to the world in a reciprochal dynamic evolution. A systems approach might very well be to introduce age and developmental stage-appropriate knowledge about how brains process information, how people think and how they feel. Focus on the individual and allow him/her to reflect on their own experiences as you build up a picture of how phenomena in the world affect them. This necessitates learning about the world, but it is based on constructing links between the things and situations that are proximal and immediately accessible to each individual and expanding in a concentric, outward push to the world as a whole, both in space and time.

        

Selling Systems Science

        

        

Conclusion

         Today we face global challenges of unprecedented scope and potential negative impact. Very serious and respected people are constructing doomsday scenarios that are truly frightening. We argue that one of the reasons that humanity faces threats like global warming with catastrophic climate change, being caught short when the fossil fuels become too expensive to extract, global-scale plagues, and the on-going curse of human aggression used to settle scores is that education has largely failed to deliver on its promise. We still believe that a truly educated populace is one capable of actualizing the promise that is human intelligence. But, we also argue that the general populace is not sufficiently educated.

         Education has evolved to reflect the general world of commerce and production. As individuals have specialized in the work they do, learning to become experts and focused on task accomplishment and much less on understanding the significance or meaning of what they do, education has followed suit. Subject silos have fragmented the knowledge of humanity and the emphasis on specialization has forced education to focus increasingly on facts and skills while rending the natural connectedness of all areas of knowledge. This anti-systems direction has cost humanity.

         Fortunately, evolution, including the evolution of knowledge, seems to produce cycles of expansion and contraction, growth and retraction. There is always a balance of energy flows, as it were, so that even when one aspect of an evolving system is contracting, another is expanding. So as the industrial revolution has played out commerce and industry have expanded while human spirit has contracted. But even as we seem at a nadir in individual integration a new force is emerging that we believe will reintegrate the human spirit with understanding of the world and how it works. Today the emerging trend is for people with mutliple disciplinary backgrounds to be in demand. People who are pattern recognizers and problem solvers are seen as far more valuable as information technology and globalization have raised the scale of social complexity. There is a new kind of Renaissance person emerging in the milieu of the information age. Businesses are recognizing, even if only vaguely, that generalists who can, nevertheless, bring detailed knowledge and skills to a wider variety of projects are far more valuable then the single-skilled worker. The businesses themselves are becoming far more interrelated and co-dependent, as in complex supply-chain networks. The new generalists are able to comprehend significant parts of such networks. They are using systems knowledge, even if it is implicit, to grasp the workings of these systems.

         The sciences are reintegrating. Cross-disciplinary research is rapidly becoming the norm. The new fields developing under the rubric of bio-tech require people who can grasp chemistry, physics, as well as genetics and more. Engineering projects are becoming more complex, mixing materials science, electronics, computation, mechanics and a variety of knowledge bases in a highly integrated fashion (e.g. the new autonomous robotics field is an example). Connections are being made.

         At the same time, the world is changing so rapidly that it is impossible to think any "job" is secure or will even exist in a few years. Today, changing careers several times in one's working life is not that uncommon. It is not unreasonable to think that this mode of working will be the norm in the near future. The need for flexibility and fast learning of new knowledge and skills will place tremendous demands on one's ability to transfer knowledge from one domain to another. Of course, our argument is that the systems science scaffold of concepts are always completely transferable and come to the new domain ready to support particulars as needed.

         An education system based on systems science, in terms of content organization and delivery approach is a revolutionary concept, but one we feel strongly will be supported by our understanding of the basic nature of the world and how humans actually learn. The matching of knowledge organization (and the pedagogy it engenders) to the way it is discovered and the way young minds assimilate and construct knowledge is the only way education will succeed. We submit that systems science as both the method and the framework of content delivery will provide that match in the most natural and ultimately fulfilling way. We think this is a way to pull out of the current quagmire.