MIT J-WEL Announces March 4 Workshop on "Human Skills" for the Workforce of the Future

CAMBRIDGE, Mass. - Jan. 23, 2020 - PRLog -- The MIT Abdul Latif Jameel World Education Lab (J-WEL) will offer a workshop on March 4, 2020, bringing together leaders in workforce learning from academic, business, non-profit, and government sectors to explore Human Skills -- the social and higher-order thinking skills that are essential to success in the dynamic organizations of today and tomorrow.  The event is titled "Human Skills: From Conversations to Convergence."

While STEM skills are valuable, they can depreciate rapidly. Human skills are longer-lasting, but also more difficult to train and assess. During this interactive workshop, which is currently open for registration (https://jwel.mit.edu/human-skills), participants will explore the value of human skills and cutting-edge ways to train and assess them across the workforce learning ecosystem.

"We're really excited about this workshop," explains J-WEL Principal Research Scientist George Westerman. "There are many different ways to define human skills and not enough agreement on how to teach and measure them. We hope to foster a conversation, and a network of interested leaders, who can start to converge on good approaches."

The workshop will be held on the MIT campus on March 4, 2020, from 8:45 am to 5 pm, followed by a reception. Register at: https://jwel.mit.edu/human-skills. Confirmed speakers include Jean Hammond (LearnLaunch), Charlie Bodwell (International Labour Organization), and Namrata Kala (MIT). The event is appropriate for all professionals involved in workforce learning and human skills at corporations, schools and universities, non-profit organizations or edtechs.

About J-WEL Workforce Learning

J-WEL Workforce Learning (https://jwel.mit.edu/workforce-learning) works with its members and other cooperating institutions to rethink the process of workforce learning around the world -- to provide the right skills to the right people at the right time, at scale. For corporations, Workforce Learning conducts research and experiments that help chief learning officers and other business executives to innovate the way they train workers and develop talent in their organizations. For individuals, Workforce Learning seeks to provide research-driven advice, right-sized learning, and tools that can help them make their individual competencies evident to potential employers. For governments and non-profit institutions, Workforce Learning conducts pilot programs and builds research-driven tools to improve workforce learning and job readiness for underserved segments of society. For more information, contact Principal Research Scientist George Westerman at georgew@mit.edu or Assistant Director Susan Young at susany@mit.edu.