The Learning Revolution - On-line Introduction

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Introduction	29

All schools are getting at least one computer for every two students; all students their own free Internet connection - to link with the 150 million others already "Net surfing" in 1999. Prime Minister Goh Chok Tong has laid out a vision of Thinking Schools, Learning Nation15 as the 21st century goal. The five-year IT budget totals $2.5 million per school.
   The Learning Revolution model: You don't have to be a giant country or state to lead the world. Visionary government helps.
   In Sydney, Australia, students at Beverley Hills High School have learned to speak fluent French by compressing a three-year course into eight weeks - using revolutionary do-it-yourself learning methods.16
   The Learning Revolution model: Accelerated learning has been proven for years in foreign-language schools; now it's everybody's turn.
   Those examples may look like isolated facts. Yet they typify the most important revolution in human history. They hold the secrets to take us all confidently into the 21st century, no matter how small, big, rich or seemingly poor the country.
   But the flip side of the future is bleak:
   In affluent western Europe, 19 million people cannot find jobs.17
   In even richer America, almost 27 million people are now living in poverty. More than 40 percent of that nation's poor are children. 40 percent of teenagers in New York City are unemployed; 20 percent in the rest of the country18 - while high-tech companies cry out for staff.
   At Britain's worst-performing schools, the average 11-year-old is reading at a five-year-old level, while top-achieving schools are three years ahead of average.19 Some political leaders are talking about a ten-year program to lift all 11-year-olds to an 11-year-old achievement-level20 - while just one of the successful programs covered in this book shows how that can be achieved in ten weeks!21
   More than half of America's young people leave school without the knowledge or foundation required to find and hold a good job.22
   In America more than 270,000 students carry guns to school, and the New York City school system now operates the eleventh largest security force in the United States, with more than 2,400 officers.23
   This book recognizes that downside, but does not dwell on it. The Learning Revolution is about practical, proven alternatives: actions and programs that work, effectively and simply, to build a better future for ourselves, our families, schools, businesses, communities and countries.
   Above all, it is a book about your personal learning revolution: how

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