The workplace of today requires its workers to use computers, understand how they interface with other technologies, think critically, solve problems, communicate effectively, apply technology to task, and work in teams. For the last several years, we have been hearing business educators talk of the need to re-engineer business education programs that prepare students for this changing workplace. In the first half of this century, business education programs prepared skilled office workers and were designed for students who were going directly to work from high school. The business of America is business.
High school prepares all students to transition to college and ultimately to career.
Therefore, Business is academic. All courses educate for business. The Virtual Enterprises, International Program, an initiative of the Board of Education of the City of New York, speaks to the challenge of preparing students for the workplace of 21st Century. The year was 1996. Virtual Enterprises, International is a capstone class that allows students to experience in a simulated business environment, all facets of being an employee in a firm.