‘Disruption is the only constant’: schools must rethink skills for the AI age, says Ukie’s Head of Education

Britain’s schools should prioritise creativity, resilience and adaptability to prepare children for a future of continual technological disruption - with video games offering powerful ways to develop those skills, according to Shahneila Saeed, Head of Education at Ukie, the UK’s interactive entertainment trade body.

Speaking to Jude Ower MBE on the latest episode of the Good Game Club podcast, released on 3 September, Saeed argues that the education system cannot keep pace with technological change - making it increasingly difficult to predict which technical skills children will need in the future. As generative AI becomes capable of performing technical tasks such as coding, she argues that human creativity and innovation will become increasingly important: “Creativity is not going away.”

“The disruption is the only constant, we know it's going to be a disrupted future,” Saeed says. “So, what we must teach our children is the ability to be creative, be innovative, to embrace challenge, be resilient and able to adapt to change.”  This will enable them “to make sense of the world around them … and grasp its opportunities.” 

Saeed created Ukie’s Digital Schoolhouse, which provides free computing workshops and resources to schools and uses play to develop computing and creative digital skills. Its network supports more than 500 schools annually, with Saeed saying the programme currently has coverage for around 77% of UK schools. Its goal is to reach 100% by 2030, but she says the principal barrier is funding. “To be brutally honest, it's the funding to be able to reach every school in the country.”

Saeed calls on the UK games industry to play a more active role in building its future workforce. “The people you want to employ tomorrow, those people are sitting in classrooms today.”  Closer engagement between businesses and schools, she argues, can make otherwise “invisible” careers in games visible to children, broaden access to the industry and help build a more diverse future workforce.

At the heart of Saeed’s argument is a challenge to traditional assumptions about education: that fun is not the opposite of serious learning, but one of its most effective drivers. “Fun for me is a fundamental part of education ... If we can make our education fun, you deepen and increase the chances of children sticking with it.”

Good Game Club is hosted by industry leaders Jude Ower MBE, Chief Strategy Officer at PlanetPlay, and Mathias Gredal Nørvig, CEO of SYBO. It is supported by the Dubai Films & Games Commission, Tencent and Xsolla, working together to shape a more positive future through the power of games.

The episode is released on 3 September and can be watched here.  For more information, please visit Linktree or contact comms@goodgame.club.