Value: Captured or Created?

"Create more value than you capture." —Tim O'Reilly, technical book publisher and entrepreneur

A recent article written by Tim O'Reilly mused about value creation vs. value capture, which got me thinking about educational value: Are we creating value or capturing value?

Image courtesy of morgueFile

With relentless emphasis on grades and test scores, I feel that today's schools and students are more focused on "value capture" than "value creation." The result is a motivation gap that is both widening and deepening within our education system—extrinsically motivated schools and students intent on grades and test scores engage more in value capture than those who seek intrinsic motivation and value creation. Of these two approaches, value capture is short-sighted and unsustainable, relying more on instant gratification and temporary "feel goods" than lifelong learning.

A continued diet of value capture (devoid of enduring understanding and lacking longterm transfer of skills and knowledge) will ultimately drive us toward intellectual starvation...