I wanted to share with you this week a persuasive essay my 17 year old son Christopher recently wrote for his Higher English. How can you relate what her writes to your Leadership and your Continual Personal Development?

The Educational Gap: Goal Setting?

Success may be defined as the progressive realization of a worthwhile goal or dream. By this definition in order to succeed and progress in any area of our lives, we must first establish a goal or dream on which to progress and succeed upon.

"A curriculum for excellence aims to ensure that all children and young people in Scotland develop the knowledge, skills and attributes they will need if they are to flourish in life, learning and work, now and in the future."

The effectiveness of any education system can be improved when goals are set by both teachers and students. Once these goals are set they help keep both students and teachers focused on what they identified as most important to their success. Although teachers are open to use goal setting as a teaching tool, it is not compulsory. However, the evidence presented in this essay illustrates how goals are a fundamental and critical development tool to aid achievement in adult life, therefore surly their compulsory inclusion as a learning tool must improve the effectiveness of all education. I will discuss in this essay the reasons behind my view that goals should be compulsory in the current education system and I will present the evidence to support this view as being a massive step forward in education.

Consider this: In his book 'What They Don't Teach You in the Harvard Business School', Mark McCormick talks about a study carried out on students in the 1979 Harvard MBA programme. In that year, the students were asked; "Have you set clear, written goals for your future and made plans to accomplish them?" Only three percent of the graduates had written goals and plans. Thirteen percent had verbalized goals; and a massive eighty four percent had no specific goals at all. Ten years later the members of the same class were interviewed again, and what they discovered was remarkable! The thirteen percent who had set verbal goals were earning an average of twice as much as the eighty four percent who had no goals at all, and the three percent who had clear written goals had on average ten times as much wealth as the other ninety seven percent combined.

A second case study was posted on January 26th 2006. A young thirteen year old male athlete named Kas had set a goal to get a personal best in a regional final in the 1500 meters. Although he never fully achieved this goal, which was mostly because of a foot injury, he increased his ranking from thirteen to fifth. This case study reflects the positive impact goal setting can have, on young peoples and adults lives.

Within our old educational system and A Curriculum for Excellence, no fundamental and progressive goal setting is compulsory; it is simply down to the individual students and teachers as to whether they set goals or not.

What we learn from these case studies is that very few people set goals or more importantly know how to, despite the proof of their positive impact in attainment! This surely means for the success that the country is striving for in the next generation of adults we must introduce an inherent goal setting culture.

Brian Tracy, a world renowned speaker and author of personal and professional development books identifies some fundamentals that make goal setting such a success and why most people don't set goals. In his book 'Eat that Frog' he identifies the proven fact that endorphins are released into the brain each time an individual achieves a task they consider to be of great value or importance. This means each time the individual achieves a written goal these endorphins are released that create positive and confident behaviours. This must surely contribute to increased productivity and motivation within the learning environment. Once a person achieves several goals and benefits from this natural high they will become positively addicted to achievement through goal setting.

Therefore the argument that is often brought up that goals are a waste of time because they don't work, is down to conditioned individual beliefs and the simple truth that people don't set goals properly. Research carried out by a world leader in personal development Brian Tracy in his book 'GOALS' states that there are four reasons why people don't set goals: They don't realize the importance of goals, or they don't know how to set goals and make them too general, ("be happy," or "make a lot of money"). To work properly Goals must be clear, written, specific, measurable and believable. The third reason is they fear failure or in some cases fear success. Failure hurts, but it is often necessary to experience failure in order to achieve the greatest success. Just as people unconsciously sabotage themselves because they fear the pain of hard work to attain the goal. The last reason is the fear of rejection; people are often afraid that if they are unsuccessful at achieving a goal, others will be critical of them.

Each one of these represent a fundamental reason as too why very few people set goals or achieve goals and the overall evidence illustrates an intrinsic weakness of our educational system: It does not take into account the importance of goals to a person's personal success and development, and especially does not take into account how beneficial they can be to the learning process and atmosphere with the school environment.

Dr. Stephen R. Covey, a world renowned psychologist and personal development expert; in his book 'The 7 Habits of Highly Effective People' names the second habit; 'Start with the end in mind'. I think this is a great mantra because after all if you don't know where you are going you will have no focus or motivation to get there. To quote Dr. Covey "goal setting is what provides us with the desire and power to accomplish any task we have."

The fundamental psychologies associated to the reason why goals do work very effectively are backed up in many other books such as 'Get the Edge' by Antony Robbins and 'The Psychology of winning' by Dr. Denis Waitley. They explain why by not setting goals you limit your ability to achieve and educate on how to precisely and properly set and realise goals.

In conclusion reaching a goal you set in your life is not success; it is the journey of moving toward that goal and what you learn by taking that journey, that will ultimately define your success. Our education system whether it is A Curriculum for Excellence or an alternative is missing out on a fundamental ingredient to maximise human potential; Goals! This does not mean A Curriculum for Excellence is not a positive step forward to the future, it is simply one which can enhanced by the introduction of goal setting., This will serve to increase the motivations of the students and teachers alike, and perhaps over time improve relationships. Therefore the earlier we teach it as a part of our education system and adopt it as a fundamental and compulsory tool the more effective we will be at ensuring all children and young people in Scotland and Britain alike develop the knowledge, skills and attitudes they will need if they are to flourish in life, learning and work, now and in the future.