Our guest for this episode of College & Career Readiness Radio is Sylvester Chisom.

Sylvester says that experiential learning is the future of career and technical education.

He tells listeners that interest assessments are critical to help students think about career options, and using assessments and other exploration tools should start in elementary school.

Sylvester brings up the concept of skills-based hiring, and schools can train and verify students in skills that they can use in their career path. The answer is not the grading system but rather a portfolio of work and competency-based learning.

Don’t miss what he says about portrait of a graduate (PoG) and grading changes associated with the skills on the PoG.

Listen to the conversation about measuring skills and earning badges in all disciplines.

Sylvester says that we need to highlight the durable skills that students are gaining so that everyone understands when they’re using certain skills, what they are, and how to transfer them in the future.

He reveals some of the key uses of AI in education, and tells listeners that we can’t be so loyal to some of the old ways of teaching in schools.

He gives an entrepreneurial example of how students can use AI to help them with their business development. And, he says that AI can help free up more time in the curriculum.

Sylvester says that as industries progress, education has to change too. We have to prepare students for a future world, not today or yesterday.

Don’t miss what he says about building curiosity and learning to ask really good questions.

Sylvester references the College & Career Readiness Radio episode with Adam Welcome where Adam talks about schools blocking important tools and the need to be more progressive with technology.

He shares several great examples of using project-based learning and notching it up to entrepreneurialism.

His notion about building students’ confidence through authentic projects is incredible.

A highlight from the conversation is the benefit of having students travel for work-based learning, which was a finding in a dissertation published by Principal-EL.

Book a time to discuss college and career readiness with the host of the show, Dr. T.J. Vari.