Artificial intelligence isn’t going to take your job. Your job will be taken by another human who knows how to connect with other humans in a world where A.I. is dominant.
13-JUNE-2026
Walter Smith is not a well-known character, but he had an enormous impact on the transformation of 19th century New England into an industrial and manufacturing giant.
In 1870, the State of Massachusetts introduced the “An Act Relating to Free Instruction in Drawing,” or commonly called The Massachusetts Drawing Act. It required drawing to be taught in all public schools, placing it alongside core subjects like reading, arithmetic and history. And they hired Walter Smith, an English art master, as State Director of Art Education.
Smith knew the power of art. He knew how important it was to the development of children’ s learning. In his own words, “Drawing depends upon two faculties – understanding and taste; skill being the result of practice or experience. It is of the utmost consequence that the first faculty should be developed in harmony with the second.”
Massachusetts already had a burgeoning industry in textiles, machinery and furniture. But factories needed more than strong backs. They needed people who could sketch, refine, and render new chair backs, case pieces and ornament detail. They needed workers who could visualize and create new textile designs. The Drawing Act pipeline produced precisely that sort of technically trained draftsman and designer. And within a decade, New England was an economic powerhouse.
Fast forward to 2026.
People are concerned about the future of work. What jobs will be available in a world where artificial intelligence is set to replace… well, everyone? As was the case with 1870 Massachusetts, the answer will be found in the arts.
Arts in education in public schools has been on the chopping block for decades because of a fundamental misunderstanding of its importance. Since at least the 1970s when I was a child in school, art was treated like it didn’t matter. It was separate from other subjects, in a stand-alone silo that made it an easy target when school boards faced funding shortfalls.
Rather than treating it separately from the core subjects, art should be more integrated throughout the child’s learning process. Students learn best when they learn through art.
They learn fractions through music. They draw their social studies. They use dance to learn science. I’ve witnessed students dancing cloud formations. Once you see a child dance like a cumulus cloud, it all makes sense! (And for a fantastic example of how arts immersion is already working, check out the Calgary Arts Academy caaschool.com)
They’ll bring visual creativity and insight to their engineering skills. Their understanding of music will make them better mathematicians. Creative writing skills will propel their excellence in communications and data science.
Because they learned through art, they’ll be more complete learners. And that will lead to more complete workers.
As for the fear of A.I. putting everyone out of work, the fear is misplaced. For sure, hundreds of thousands of jobs — the kind we knew and (sorta) loved in the 20th century – will be gone. But new roles and ways of earning income will emerge. I don’t even want to call them “jobs” because the nature of how we earn income will look very different.
Artificial intelligence isn’t going to take your job. Your job will be taken by another human who knows how to connect with other humans in a world where A.I. is dominant.
The successful worker of the future will know how to connect with other humans through creativity, passion, imagination and emotion.
And isn’t that really what art is all about?
