There's an interesting discussion waiting to take place on someone's LJ pages on what 17 and 18 year olds should study. I interviewed a school-leaver the other day for a job at JOLF as a trainee accounting technician. His three A-levels were Maths, Further Maths and Physics. He would have been a stronger candidate with a broader range of thinking. Sophie's suggestion of something like the Bacc would help, but would that mean that new undergraduates weren't as skilled in their chosen subject as people doing the standard three A-levels? Maybe a decent compromise would be to do one specialist subject plus a general qualification.

I would like to see more people know about economics (part of the reason for my recent economics posts) and that is something that could be compatible with teaching younger children about scientific methodology, bias, scepticism, peer review etc. First year of secondary school would be a good time to run lessons on 'How to think' that could cover all of these areas.