2018 Frederic W. Ness Book Award, AAC&U

How can educators ensure that young people who attain a postsecondary credential are adequately prepared for the future? Matthew T. Hora and his colleagues explain that the answer is not simply that students need more specialized technical training to meet narrowly defined employment opportunities. Beyond the Skills Gap challenges this conception of the "skills gap," highlighting instead the value of broader twenty-first-century skills in postsecondary education. They advocate for a system in which employers share responsibility along with the education sector to serve the collective needs of the economy, society, and students.

Drawing on interviews with educators in two- and four-year institutions and employers in the manufacturing and biotechnology sectors, the authors demonstrate the critical importance of habits of mind such as problem solving, teamwork, and communication. They go on to show how faculty and program administrators can create active learning experiences that develop students' skills across a range of domains. The book includes in-depth descriptions of eight educators whose classrooms exemplify the effort to blend technical learning with the cultivation of twenty-first-century habits of mind.

The study, set in Wisconsin, takes place against the backdrop of heated political debates over the role of public higher education. This thoughtful and nuanced account, enriched by keen observations of postsecondary instructional practice, promises to contribute new insights to the rich literature on workforce development and to provide valuable guidance for postsecondary faculty and administrators.
About the Author: Matthew T. Hora is an assistant professor of Adult and Higher Education in the Department of Liberal Arts and Applied Studies at the University of Wisconsin-Madison, and a research scientist at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research. After several years of experience in organic agriculture and food systems research, Matthew received his master's degree in applied anthropology from the University of Maryland-College Park. He then worked as a program evaluator of public health initiatives and STEM education initiatives before earning a PhD in the learning sciences from the Department of Educational Psychology at UW-Madison in 2012.

Matthew's research interests are situated in the fields of applied anthropology, the learning sciences, and education policy analysis. In his current work he addresses three questions: What is the purpose and role of higher education in the early twenty-first century? How can we best design learning environments (organizations, classrooms, and digital spaces) that facilitate the acquisition of disciplinary content and transferable skills? How do cultural, political, historical, and economic factors shape how national higher education systems approach their roles in workforce development and advancing the public good?

Matthew lives in Madison, Wisconsin, with his family.

Ross J. Benbow is an associate researcher with the Wisconsin Center for Education Research at UW-Madison. With a background in political science, international development, and comparative analysis, Ross earned his PhD from the Department of Educational Policy Studies at UW-Madison in 2011 after conducting a yearlong ethnographic study of higher education reform in the United Republic of Tanzania. He has more recently worked as a writer and analyst focusing on the relationships between public policy, teaching and learning, and individual meaning making in domestic and international educational contexts, with a particular interest in patterns of inequity in colleges and universities.

Ross lives in Madison, Wisconsin, with his partner and daughter.

Amanda K. Oleson, Wisconsin born and bred, is an education scholar particularly interested in research and policies related to PK-20/workforce pathways. She spent several years as an assistant researcher at the Wisconsin Center for Education Research in the Center on Education and Work after graduating with her master's degree in Educational Policy Studies from UW-Madison, where she also earned her bachelor's degree in psychology and English. Amanda previously worked on research studies related to higher education reform and data-driven decision making. She is now a qualitative analyst at the Madison Metropolitan School District in Madison, Wisconsin.

A nascent connoisseur of coffee and an old bookshop enthusiast, Amanda enjoys the adventures that accompany reading, writing, and (lifelong) learning.