Education: The Last Frontier 教育：最需要开垦的地方

　　Rupert Murdoch e-G8 Forum Paris e-G8峰会，巴黎

　　24 May 2019 - Maurice, thank you for that gracious introduction.

　　莫里斯,谢谢你帮我做的自我介绍

　　Thank you as well for the invitation to speak today.

　　同时谢谢你邀请我来演讲

　　We are living through a time when many of our leading economies are not performing as they should.

　　我们今天处在一个很多经济强国没有尽到他们责任的时代。

　　To this challenge, this audience brings the promise of digital and the spirit of innovation. So I know you are all as pleased as I am that the G-8 leaders have made your contributions to economic growth a priority for their meeting this week.

　　为了迎接这个挑战，现场在座的各位都带来了他们的在电子创新领域的承诺和精神。G-8的领导人们在这次峰会上把你们对经济的贡献作为一项重要的议程，我也为各位开心，

　　In particular, I wish to thank President Sarkozy and our French hosts. Not only have they provided this magnificent setting, they remind us of a truth reflected in the proud history of this great nation: that artists and creators add great value to society. We hope the G-8 will strongly affirm that the property rights of artists and creators are more than a matter of protecting cultures. In this new century, they are essential requirements for a dynamic economy and the digital future.

　　在此我特别想感谢法国总统Sarkozy 和我们的法国东道主。他们不仅为我们提供了这样宏伟的场地，同时也提醒了我们这个伟大国家背后的优良传统：艺术家和创作者为社会带了巨大的贡献。我们也希望G-8能够强有力的保障艺术家和创作者的版权。这不仅仅是保护版权，更是在保护我们的文化。在这个新时代，这是保证未来一个充满活力的电子经济发展的必要前提。

　　That digital future - and its connection with education - is my topic this afternoon.

　　科技和教育的关系，是我今天演讲的主题。

　　Every CEO will tell you that we compete in a world that is changing faster than ever. That it is more competitive than ever and that it rewards success and punishes failure to a greater degree than ever before.

　　每一个CEO都会告诉你这个世界比以往任何一个时期变化要快。竞争更加激烈，胜者王，败者寇，在这个时代尤为明显。

　　In other words, our world is increasingly, and rightly, a world of merit. In such a world, the greatest challenge for any enterprise is human capital: how to find it, develop it and keep it.

　　换一个说法，今天的世界是一个人才的世界。在这个世界里，所有企业面临最大的挑战就是人才资源：怎么样找到人才，培养人才和留住人才。

　　No one in this room needs a lecture about how talented people in tandem with technology are making our lives richer and fuller.

　　今天的在座不需要我告诉你们科技怎样在改变我们的生活，怎样在创造更多的财富。

　　Everywhere we turn, digital advances are making workers more productive - creating jobs that did not exist only a few years ago, and liberating us from the old tyrannies of time and distance. This is true in every area except one: Education.

　　不管我们去到哪里，我们都可以看到电子科技给生产力带来的进步。科技也创造了比以往更多的工作机会，同时把我们从时间和空间的局限中解放出来。

　　Think about that. In every other part of life, someone who woke up after a fifty-year nap would not recognize the world around him.

　　大家不知道有没有想过，当今科技发展是如此的迅速。如果五十年前有一个人沉睡醒来，他将完全不能相信他今天身边发生的事情：

　　In medicine, doctors who once diagnosed patients with tools they could fit in their leather bags would be astonished to find their 21st century counterparts using CAT-scans and MRIs.

　　医学领域，以前用着听诊器的医生绝对想不到今天的同行们在用着CT扫描和核磁共振。

　　In finance, brokers who once issued old-fashioned share certificates have been replaced by online brokerages allowing people to trade across the world at any hour of the day.

　　金融领域，股票经纪曾经靠发放纸制的股票本票，今天都已经被网上交易所取代。

　　In my industry, editors who put out newspapers the night before now marvel at the sight of readers getting news delivered to cellphones and tablets.

　　拿我自己的行业来说，曾经只靠纸质报纸出版的编辑们，也会被读者对平板电脑和智能电话来接受新闻信息的依赖性而惊讶。

　　But not in education. Our schools remain the last holdout from the digital revolution. The person who woke up from that fifty-year nap would find that today's classroom looks almost exactly the same as it did in the Victorian age: a teacher standing in front of a roomful of kids with only a textbook, a blackboard, and a piece of chalk.

　　遗憾的是，教育界不在这个行列内。我们的学校仍然是这场科技革命风暴的没能席卷的最后一个角落。五十年前沉睡然后醒来的那个人，他仍然看到今天的教室和五十年前维多利亚时代一模一样：一位教师站在一群孩子面前，拿着一本书，后面一块黑板，和一只粉笔。

　　My friends, what we have here is a colossal failure of imagination. Worse, it is an abdication of our responsibility to our children and grandchildren - and a limitation on our future. As Stendhal wrote: "Qui s'excuse, s'accuse".

　　在座的朋友们，这是我们一个巨大的失败。这是我们对下一代甚至下下一代的不负责任，对我们未来的不负责任。就如著名法国作家司汤达说的："Qui s'excuse, s'accuse". (大意是，为自己推卸责任的时候，同时也是在承认自己的失败)

　　We know the old answer - simply throwing money at the problem - doesn't work. In my own country, we've doubled our spending on primary and secondary education over the last three decades - while our test scores have remained largely flat. The reason this hasn't worked is that more money has fed a system that is no longer designed to educate - it's become a jobs program for teachers and administrators. And yet we Americans wonder why we have cities like Detroit where nearly half the population can't read and the disadvantaged are on a fast-track to failure.

　　我们都惯于用一些老借口，比如把问题怪到没有资金的头上，这说不通。在我的国家(美国)，我们的小学到高中的教育费用在30年里增加了两倍，但是学生平均分还是跟30年前一样。说不通的原因就在于钱用在了一个不是为了教育的教育系统上。这个系统变成了一个老师和管理人员的铁饭碗，而不是为了教育。但我们美国人还在挠着脑袋想，为什么有很多城市像底特律一样，一半的人口都不识字。这个问题加速了我们教育上的失败。

　　The mandarins of mediocrity will tell you that the problem is that the kids they are teaching are too poor, or come from bad families, or are immigrants who do not understand the culture. This is absolute rubbish. It is arrogant, elitist and utterly unacceptable.

　　那些碌碌无为的官员只会告诉你问题出在：这些小孩的家庭太穷，没有家教，或者来自那些不了解美国文化的移民家庭。这根本是屁话!我完全不能接受这样傲慢自大的精英主义借口。

　　In places such as China and India, they understand that they can't afford excuses. When I visit these countries, I am amazed by how much they accomplish with far fewer resources - and how eagerly they embrace innovation. Their spirit is reflected in the international comparisons, where many of the top performers are Asian and many of those sliding down the middle or bottom are from the industrialized West. The Asian Tigers have the unfair advantage of Tiger Mothers who see in their children the power of potential, not the liability of limits.

　　在中国和印度，他们知道他们不能推卸教育的责任。当我探访这些国家时，我发现他们在用最少的资源办最多的事，他们是多么迫切地想把科技带入教育。这种精神在国际教育上得到了肯定，最好的证明就是全球成绩最好的学生几乎都是亚洲学生，最差的都是西方国家。亚洲虎妈妈们也许没有占尽优势，但是小亚洲虎崽们却表现出无限的潜力。(比喻亚洲虽然是发展中国家，但是人才优势潜力无限。)

　　Of course, you don't have to be Asian to succeed. In my own hometown, I've been impressed by the Harlem Success Academy - a largely African-American charter school, located in one of the poorest communities in America. The neighborhood surrounding this school has all the pathologies that are generally invoked to explain away failure. But at Harlem Success, they set high standards. They test. They insist that parents check homework. They use technology, including providing a Kindle and a laptop for each student in the higher grades.

　　当然，你不需要做亚洲人才可以成功。在美国我的家乡，哈林成才特许公立学校给我留下了深刻的印象。一个主要由黑人学生组成的学校，在美国最贫困的区域。附近的学校都在随大流，用贫困来解释学生成绩差的原因。但是哈林的成功给他们立了一个最好的榜样。他们定时测验，坚持家长要检查学生家庭作业，他们大量使用科技，包括给高年级学生提供一个Kindle电子阅读器和一个笔记本电脑。

　　And they get results: their students are now achieving scores equal to those attending schools for the gifted and talented.

　　他们的回报：普遍学生的分数上升到跟其他学校的天才学生们一样。

　　For example, more than 90% of its students score at the highest level of New York's science tests. And the parents know - that's why they have many more children trying to get in than they have places for them.

　　90%的学生得到纽约学区科学类科目的最高分数。父母们也很清楚，因为很多父母现在为了子女能够进这所学校而挤破了头。

　　That school shows that you can build human capital even in extreme circumstances. But let's be blunt: we don't have nearly enough schools like Harlem Success. And that represents a tremendous loss of human capital that is almost impossible to recover.

　　这个例子证明了就算在困境中，也可以找到方法去培养人才。让我们诚实的面对自己，我们没有足够的像哈林这样的学校。这也代表了我们正在流失未来的人才，如果我们错过了这个时机，我们将没有回头路。

　　If we knew we had a gold mine on our property, we would do whatever it took to get that gold out of the ground. In education, by contrast, we keep the potential of millions of children buried in the ground. 举一个例子，如果我们知道我们坐拥一座金矿，我们会想尽一切办法把这些金子从地底挖出来。但是在教育上，正好相反，我们把千千万万孩子的潜力永远深埋在了地下。

　　Fortunately, we have the means at our disposal to transform lives. 幸运的是，我们拥有改变这一切的工具。

　　The same digital technologies that transformed every other aspect of modern life can transform education, provide our businesses with the talent they need to thrive, and give hundreds of millions of young people at the fringes of prosperity the opportunity to make their own mark on this global economy.

　　科技改变了这个时代的方方面面，科技也能一定能改变教育。这样既能给我们的企业输送人才，又能帮助千千万万的年轻人在这个全球经济一体的时代里留下他们自己的篇章。

　　This afternoon, I'd like to offer just three examples of how bringing digital innovation to the classroom can substantially improve education for children throughout the world - including many now callously written off as hopeless.

　　今天，我想给大家带来全球教育界三个科技改变教育的例子。甚至有一些曾经不可能实现的例子。

　　We must begin by exciting the imaginations of our young people. The key is not a computer or a tablet or some other device. The key is the software that will engage students and help teach them concepts and learn to think for themselves.

　　我们首先要激发年轻人的想象力。关键不是简单的只是让他们去使用新的电脑或者平板，而是给学生带来学习兴趣，知识和独立思考的好软件。

　　Every study will tell you that the more interactive and intimate learning is, the better the student will perform.

　　所有的研究都指出，越是直接互动的教学方法，对学生的效果越好。

　　Let's say I was trying to teach a 10-year-old about Bernoulli's principle. It's named after the famous 18th-century mathematician. According to this principle, when speed is high, pressure is low. Sounds pretty dry. But what if I could link the lesson to the football star Roberto Carlos - whose famous curved shot is an illustration of this principle at work. And suppose I then included an explanation from one of the world's leading airplane engineers about how this same principle works in aviation.

　　比如说我要教一个10岁小孩柏努利法则。这是起名于一个很有名的18世纪数学家柏努利的法则。根据这个法则，当速度高的时候，压力就会低。听起来很无聊吧?但是如果我能把这个法则联系到以香蕉球著名的足球明星-罗伯特 卡洛斯的时候，这样就很有趣了吧?(球的一侧高速旋转，造成低气压，球就会划出弧线。)又或者是我再加入一个世界级的飞机工程师对这个法则的解释，并且举出这个法则对飞机的飞行有何影响。

　　Some businesses who are looking ahead are already giving us an idea of what this would look like. In two small schools in California, a traditional textbook publisher has partnered with Apple to teach algebra. They've given the kids free iPads, and they've created an app that gives students guided instruction, instant feedback on practice questions, and access to several hundred videos. If students don't understand the lesson the first time, they can watch that lesson repeatedly until they get it.

　　有些企业已经加入到我们的行列并付诸实际。在加州的两座规模较小的学校，一个传统教科书出版商和苹果合作提供代数的课程。孩子们配备有免费的iPad， 并且开发了一个软件来指导孩子学习，习题的成绩也有及时反馈。除此之外，还有上百个教学视频可以供孩子们观看。如果学生们第一次没有看懂，他们可以重复看视频来慢慢理解。

　　Is anyone surprised that the teachers say the students using this new algebra program are testing better than those who don’t?

　　有没有人会觉得惊讶这些学生的代数成绩比以前好多了呢?

　　Exciting young imaginations leads directly to my second point: more personalized learning.

　　听完这这令人鼓舞兴奋的例子，让我们来看看第二个例子：更个性化的学习方法

　　In media and technology, we have learned how to micro-target audiences - to maximize the stickiness of our websites, to personalize our news feeds. Now we need to bring these kinds of expertise to education - to make mathematics sticky - to micro-target the 8th grade girls who might want to be physicists, and to personalize the reading for each student.

　　在媒体和科技领域中，我们学会了细分我们的垂直用户。这样可以增强我们网站的粘性，个性化我们的News feed(新闻馈送)。现在我们需要把这些方法运用到教育上。比如让数学增加粘性，细分出未来想当物理学家的初二女孩，然后个性化他们的学习方法和过程。

　　If a gifted child can finish a four-year course in two years, shouldn't we encourage her? Likewise, if a struggling child needs more time, shouldn’t we help him too? Unfortunately for too many students in too many classrooms, it's still one-size- fits-all.

　　如果说一个天才儿童能够在2年内完成4年的课程，我们不是很应该鼓励他吗?同样的，如果一个有学习障碍的儿童需要更多时间，我们不是也应该帮助他吗?

　　Ask teachers how that's working out. Ask them about the challenge of dealing with 30 kids in a classroom, each of whom is an individual who goes at his own pace and has his own best way of learning. Right now most students are stuck going over the same lesson plan in the same way at the same pace. That only frustrates the kids who could do more advanced work - while leaving behind those who can't keep up.

　　大家可以去问一问教师们。问问他们教学30个学生遇到的挑战，每个学生都有他们自己的学习曲线和学习方法。但是现在他们都被放在一起，同一个学习计划，同一个方学习法，同一个学习曲线。

　　Let's consider a student trying to understand fractions. There are many different ways to teach children fractions - all of which work for some kids, and don't work for others. Why should we be limited? Why can't we use digital technology to give teachers the choice of all of them?

　　再让我们来想一想一个学生如何学习分数。教分数由很多种方法，有一些方法有些小孩能够接受，但是另外一些未必能。为什么我们要局限教学的方法呢?为什么我们不让科技来给教师和学生更多的选择，让他们接触每一种方法?

　　For example, for some children the best answer will be an online tutor who guides them every step of the way. For others, it might be a cartoon produced by the world's best animators illustrating how fractions represent parts of a whole. For still others, it could be listening to the nation's best math teacher laying out problems that the child answers at his own pace, under the supervision of a classroom teacher. The key is the ability to analyze where children are in their learning and what they need to move ahead.

　　举个例子，对于有些学生来说，最好的教学方式可能是一个远程家教手把手地教他们分数的每一步。对于有些学生，可能是看一个世界上最好的卡通工作室做出来的教学分数的卡通影片。还有一些学生，可能是由全国最好的教师远程教学，然后再由课堂上的老师帮助。关键在于分析孩子们学会了什么，他们下一步应该学什么。

　　We already have one program like this that we put on an iPod. It's been used at schools for American children on the military base at Okinawa. With this program, a teacher can instantly diagnose where a child is in his or her reading - and then produce a customized textbook for the next ten days. The parent can check it at any time to see how much his child is learning.

　　iPad上已经有了一个这样的软件。冲绳岛上的美军子弟学校已经在使用这个软件，教师可以当下知道一个学生阅读的速度，然后根据每个人的速度制定十天内的阅读计划。父母也可以借助这个软件马上知道他们的小孩学到了多少东西。

　　I promise you, this is only the beginning. Everywhere else in our economy, digital is forcing businesses to let their customers customize their clothing, their cuisine, their news, and most anything else they want to buy. My challenge for everyone in this room today is to help us do the same for a child's education.

　　我向你保证，我说的这些只是开始。我们经济的方方面面已经在做客制化，科技正在推动着企业为他们的顾客去客制衣服，餐饮，新闻和任何能想到的商品。而我的挑战在于我怎么能够让在座的各位也帮助我，去为教育做同样的事情。

　　Finally, with digital we can bring the world's greatest thinkers to every student, anywhere in the world, at a very low cost.

　　最后，科技能够为全世界的学生带来最好的讲师，但是同时又能节省开支。

　　Outside the classroom, digital has already done this. Not so very long ago, you had to be rich to hear the best opera or symphony. Now you can now download the world's best recording of your favourite Mozart concerto for about a dollar. And you can listen to it as often as you want. So if there were one teacher in Brittany who came up with the best course for teaching French history, there's no reason why this course should not be immediately available to every student anywhere in France - or Vietnam for that matter.

　　教育界外，其实已经有先例了。十几年前，你要很有钱才能去听最好的歌剧或者交响乐。现在，你可以用一美金下载你最喜欢的莫扎特交响乐，想什么时候听都可以。同理，如果一个布列塔尼(法国一个半岛)的老师有一堂很好的法国历史课程，为什么这个课程不能被世界其他地方的学生分享呢?比如说越南的学生。

　　Come to think of it, there is no reason that a student anywhere in the world - in Beijing, Boston, or Berlin - should not have access to the physicist Stephen Hawking explaining science; the cellist Yo-Yo Ma explaining harmony; the historian Andrew Roberts explaining Churchill; the Nobel-winning economist Amartya Sen explaining economics and so on. All these people could be brought into any classroom around the world for what we now pay to download a song.

　　想起来，同样没有理由为什么世界其他地区像北京，波士顿，柏林不能让斯蒂芬霍金(美国著名科学家)来讲课呢?为什么不能让马友友来讲音乐，让安德鲁罗伯兹(历史学家)来讲丘吉尔，让阿马蒂亚森(经济学家)讲经济。。。? 我们可以把这些人带到同一个教室，学生们也只用出我们现在下载一首音乐的钱， 一美金。

　　I know the critics say that if you introduce technology to the classroom, you are simply replacing teachers with computers and blackboards with screens. But the critics are wrong.

　　我知道一定会有反对意见说，如果你把这样的科技带进教室，你就是用电脑在取代教师。这些反对意见是错的。

　　Technology will never replace the teacher. What we can do is relieve some of the drudgery of teaching. And we can take advantage of the increasingly sophisticated analytics that will help teachers spend more time on the things that make us all more human and more creative.

　　科技永远不能取代教师。我们所做的是减轻教师的负担，同时可以利用科技为我们来做教育的深入分析，让教师把时间用在启发学生的创造性和人性上。

　　Let me be clear. What I am speaking about is not the outline of some exotic, distant, fictional future. Everything I have mentioned is something I have seen in the here and now:

　　让我再次澄清一点，我说的例子不是一个遥不可及的未来。我说的例子就发生在现在。

　　In Korea, I was astonished to learn that a vibrant, $30 billion consumer market for after-school education has transformed outstanding teachers into national celebrities - with some commanding the same salaries as sports heroes and film stars.

　　在韩国，我亲眼看到了一个补习经济把优秀老师打造成明星的奇迹。有些老师甚至拿着运动明星和影星的薪水。

　　In Sweden, I visited an innovative school known as the "IKEA school." Learning is supported by a "knowledge portal" that contains the entire syllabus. In this school, learning fits the individual student's pace and interests - and the teachers give students plenty of individual attention. This school is possible because of a system that encourages competition by letting parents use public money to choose what schools they think work best for their children. That includes schools that are privately-run and for-profit.

　　在瑞典，我参观了一间“宜家”学校，教学大纲就像宜家的家具一样放在网上让学生自由选择组合。这样教师就有更多的时间来给需要的学生更多的帮助。这间学校的建成，得益于一个很好的教学基金系统来激化学校之间的竞争。这个系统让父母可以有一定数额的虚拟基金，他们可以选择他们信任的学校来投入虚拟基金，然后国家会对这个学校进行资金投入。他们选择的学校可以是公立的，也可以是私立的。

　　Back in my own hometown, I visited the "School of One." Like Google, this New York school is powered by an algorithm. Every day, it figures out what each individual needs to learn next and how best he or she will learn it. One day I asked a child who was helping him with his work - it turns out the boy was working with an online tutor from Mumbai.

　　在我的家乡，我探访了“School of One”，像谷歌一样，这间纽约学校也是虚拟的。每天，它会自动分析每个学生下一步应该学什么，和怎么样教学他们才能让学生学得更好。有一天，我问一个学生谁在教他做作业，他说是远在孟买的一个家教。

　　Another student, in the middle of the year, was supposed to be in 8th grade math. But he was mastering the subject so quickly he had already moved onto 9th grade math.

　　还有一个学生，年中的时候，应该是在学初二数学课程。但是他的学习速度突飞猛进，现在已经学到初三数学了。

　　Right now, these are just bits and pieces. Our challenge is to learn from what works best - wherever in the world we find it - and put it all together.

　　这些只是沧海一粟。我们的挑战来自于把全世界最好的经验放到一起，真正应用起来。

　　My company is determined to try - in a big way.

　　我的公司会坚定地在这条路上走下去。

　　My challenge to you this afternoon is to bring your own skills to the table. The world needs you to bring to our schools the same creative force that makes businesses competitive and nations thrive.

　　我今天演讲的目的是希望在座能够用你们的技术和经验来帮助这场教育革命。这个世界需要你们把你们在商业上获得的成功同样拷贝到教育上。

　　In doing this, we will supply our economies with all the talent and energy they need to grow. In doing this, we will ensure that the poor child in Manila will have the same opportunities as a rich child in Manhattan. In doing this, we will elevate the status of good teachers everywhere - excite the undeveloped minds of our young and ensure that no child will be left on the margins of the great prosperity this global economy offers.

　　只有这样，我们才可以为我们的经济输送人才。只有这样，我们才能保证一个马尼拉的贫苦孩子能够和一个在曼哈顿的富裕家庭的孩子有同样的机会。只有这样，我们才能把优秀教师的地位提高。让我们的孩子发挥更多的潜力，同时一个孩子也不落下。

　　In our own backyards, we have millions of young people whose minds are the key to our future. It is time to insist that our schools use every technology we can to unlock their potential - and treat them as the precious resource they are.

　　在我们每个人自己的国家里，有千千万万的年轻人，他们的思想是我们未来的关键。是时候坚持我们的学校应该应用所有能够帮助教育的科技来激发他们的潜力，对待他们，就像对待金子一样。

　　Thank you. 谢谢