How should high schools help students prepare for the future of work?

More residents say high schools should focus on developing real world skills than on fundamentals of subject matter like reading and writing, by a 61 percent to 39 percent margin. This dichotomy was strongly negatively related to age, with 77 percent of young adults (ages 18-24) favoring a focus on real world skills compared to 53 percent of older adults (ages 65 and over). It also showed a strong negative relationship to education level, from 81 percent for those with less than a high school degree to just over 50 percent for those with a bachelor’s degree or higher. The relationship to income was neutral, however. Blacks showed a greater preference for real world learning than whites, 68 percent compared to 60 percent, though this difference was not statistically significant.