Digital literacy refers to our ability to understand technologies and how to use them. While we are not all software developers or programmers, nor do we need to be, digital literacy is important to each of us. Whether you’re a banker trying to manage millions of transactions every minute, a doctor creating the future of virtual health solutions, a programmer creating software or a parent trying to manage your child’s screen time, technology impacts everyone every day.
Why should you care about digital literacy?
Indeed.com, a job search site, states that digital literacy is one of the 13 most important skills for job seekers to develop1. Historically, new technologies have brought about dramatic improvement in the quality of our lives. Lamplighters were replaced by electrical power, horse and buggy with the automobile, video rental with digital streaming. Within the palm of your hands, your smart phone fulfills the imagination of 1960 science fiction shows. Technology is the critical factor producing faster and more efficient modes of transportation, improving energy management, creating instantaneous access to your money digitally and the ability to collaborate with people in real time across the world.
We are geographically positioned to take advantage of the next innovation revolution. Major health care providers, fintech companies, startups and innovation hubs are actively expanding and relocating to the First Coast. To connect the First Coast with the Space Coast, the burgeoning commercial space industry needs top talent in engineering, information technology and aviation. We need to maintain our edge and further develop the skills and talents to support these forward-looking industries.
What can you do?
Making investments and dedicating time in both your and your children’s ability to learn to code and exploring technologies will help increase digital literacy. Getting started early helps build an understanding of technology that will ready you for future innovations. Exploring programs offered at organizations like Code Ninjas can help develop digital literacy skills.
To be digitally literate, do you need to know how to write the code? Maybe not, but you absolutely need to know how the code works. Do you wonder why Facebook or Google is able to present an advertisement for something that you are interested in and may have even just mentioned within a conversation? Someone wrote the algorithm that shapes the content you see on your screen but, without digital literacy, how do you know if you should trust this information?
The more comfortable we get with technology, the better we understand it and can influence positive change. Exposure to coding can provide the foundation to build your digital literacy. Today, you will hear buzzwords like artificial intelligence, augmented reality, robotics, internet of things (IoT) and other intangible concepts that may ultimately drive the future of our existence. Will you haphazardly chase the next shiny object, or will you have the digital literacy to understand the nuance value proposition of a technology, which can help focus your efforts and your business’ priority.
In closing, our ability to develop our community’s digital literacy will shape the future we live in. Investing in your digital literacy will help prepare you for the future. From a community perspective, your and your children’s digital literacy will result in the continued expansion of these career opportunities, providing a healthy economy and further improvement in our quality of life. Will you be ready?
1 https://in.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/skills-of-the-future, Jan 8, 2023
Ryan Clark is the owner of Code Coast Consulting DBA Code Ninjas Fleming Island | Ponte Vedra | World Golf Village.
