To be prepared

I watched with interest the story about a soprano, Marlis Peterson, who had three days to prepare for a role with the Metropolitan Opera. I encourage you to watch the video. She came to New York immediately after singing Medea in Vienna. How tired must she have been?

The first full run-through was at the performance. Now I've done plenty of gigs where the performance was the first time I played the song, but not a serious opera. Amazing stuff.

It also brings to the front two big points about education:

• She has lots, and lots of years of schooling. She is incredibly prepared for this.
• We couldn't teach her this online.

As Daniel Pink states, the creative arts and design must be central to the new economic frontier. I would put this lady to work in any company or government project. We can't outsource this work.

We must teach our students how to be ready for anything, just as Marlis Peterson was.