Inquiry-Based Learning Could've Saved Me

MY ADVICE TO COLLEGE STUDENTS?
Become conversant in your chosen career field's current issues. Be ready to discuss them, share your thoughts on them, offer solutions for them.

WHY IS THIS MY ADVICE?
In my first professional interview after graduating from college (an undisclosed number of decades ago), I was trying to get a high school teaching position in another state due to my husband's base assignment in the U.S. Air Force. The question that tripped me up? "Tell me about education in Kansas right now -- any problems, issues, controversies?"

My answer? "Oh there is nothing wrong in Kansas! Everything is great! No problems in education in Kansas!"

The principal's face visibly fell into an incredulous expression that conveyed, better than any words could have, that I had just seriously embarrassed myself. And the interview didn't last much longer. Evidently, he wasn't looking for a naive Kansas girl wearing rose-colored glasses.

HENCE MY SOAPBOX.
Kansas schools, colleges, and universities: What are we doing to ensure that high school and university graduates are conversant in current issues and controversies in their chosen fields?

I asked the chair of my college-senior son's academic department how the curriculum prepares the students for this challenge. His answer was not satisfactory: "We cover that." He cited human and financial resources as the limiting factor in the department's ability to cover it more thoroughly. He obviously did not understand my meaning.

I would really love to hear from education professionals on this one.

Describe specific learning experiences that you design for your students geared toward learning how to inquire, study, and possibly even solve an issue or contribute intelligently to an important debate in a professional setting.

Offering any number of "current events" classes is not enough. These inquiries should be embedded across the curriculum. Whatever the subject, students should be challenged to discover what the issues/controversies are in subject-related business/industry and those issues/controversies' impact -- locally, regionally, nationally, globally. Students should also be required to collaborate with each other and business/industry pros on possible solutions.

This is what inquiry- or problem-based learning is all about. Are we making it happen in the classroom? If so, how? If not, when do we start?