What if school were designed to form X-shaped individuals rather than T-shaped individuals?

Inspired by two things:

1. Heather McGowan’s notion of the X-shaped individual.

2. This passage from ”Why the Future Belongs to Polymaths” by Zat Rana:

“The big difference between the approaches of a polymath and a specialist is that the specialist picks a spot and then goes deep, whereas the polymath is on a lane that continuously gets wider.

“These are obviously not mutually exclusive, and the ideal combination to me is one that relies on a strong understanding of the fundamentals of many disciplines with a specific domain or two in which you specialize.

“That said, if we take just a specialist and a polymath separately, beyond just the benefit of the creative connections that are available from having studied broadly, the polymath also has a learning advantage.

“Learning itself is a skill, and when you exercise that skill across domains, you get specialized as a learner in a way that someone who goes deep doesn’t.

“You learn how to learn by continuously challenging yourself to grasp concepts of a broad variety. This ironically then allows you to specialize in something else faster if you so choose. This is an incredibly valuable advantage.”

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Each Wednesday we share a “what if” scenario. These are not suggestions as much as provocations.

If you have a “what if” scenario you would like to share, just send an email (and indicate whether you would like it attributed it to you).

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