2023

Excel in
Education

Author
Andrew Moss
Contents

3 Introduction
The UK education system (England) |
Information and communication technology (ICT) v computing

7 Computing curriculum structure

Primary School | Secondary School

18 Panel discussion: ‘Excel in education’

Global Excel Summit 2023

29 Poll Results

31 Points of view
Celia Alves | Andrew Moss (Global Excel Summit)

36 Conclusion
Introduction
Introduction
Data is the brain of the world. It's behind the modern surge in automation and
artificial intelligence (AI), which are taking over everything. From banking to
healthcare to manufacturing robots to smart assistants to self-driving cars. There
isn't much it isn't responsible for.

It's also an invaluable tool for businesses that make data-led decisions daily to
establish baselines, benchmarks, and targets to propel themselves forward.

Careers are rapidly changing as well, and the needs of today are not the same as
yesteryear. It's predicted that AI alone will create 97 million new jobs by 2025.

With all this considered, it only makes sense that the next generation of workers is
nurtured and prepared appropriately for what's to come.

One automation tool that is ubiquitous across the business landscape is Excel, a
spreadsheet application developed by Microsoft. Its fundamental purpose is to
store, organise, and perform calculations on data.

Common workplace uses include:

Accounting
Financial analysis
Business analysis
Office administration
Project management

These are only five, but the actual number is as long as your arm!

Excel usage doesn't only span stereotypically data-heavy occupations like data
analysts, financial analysts, and accountants. Marketers, graphic designers, and
customer service assistants may well require it in their daily operations too.

Given Excel's prominence in the workplace and how many companies demand
proficiency these days, how are people being prepared during their formative
years?

4
In the first part, we’ll explore how Excel is taught in the UK education system and
what can be done better to ensure children are sufficiently geared up for their
working lives.

The UK education system (England)

Let's first understand the four stages of compulsory education.

KeyStage 1
Year 1–2 (age 5–7)

Key Stage 2
Year 3–6 (age 7–11)

Key Stage 3
Year 7–9 (age 11–14)

Key Stage 4
Year 10–11 (age 14–16)

Although this is the standard structure, some schools opt to trigger Key Stage 4 in
year 9, as Ofsted, a government department responsible for inspecting and
regulating schools, does not have an approved model, which means schools are
free to decide.

Information and communication technology (ICT) vs computing

The Education Reform Act of 1988 made ICT a compulsory subject for all pupils
aged 5 to 16. For over two decades, it focused on teaching children the basics of
information and different communication methods, such as word processing,
presentations and, yes…spreadsheets.

However, 2012 saw an important shift take place. Determined to find a long-term
solution to the skills gaps plaguing the country, then education-secretary Michael
Gove decided to scrap ICT and replace it with computing. This wasn't merely a
name change; it was indicative of a long-standing issue with the curriculum and the
need to update it to reflect changing times.

Microsoft, Google, the British Computer Society, and the Royal Academy of
Engineering all had a say in the new curriculum.

5
“ICT used to focus purely on computer literacy – teaching pupils, over
and over again, how to word-process, how to work a spreadsheet,
how to use programs already creaking into obsolescence; about as
much use as teaching children to send a telex or travel in a zeppelin.”

— Michael Gove (former education secretary)

Computing meant a more technical and deeper syllabus, with a shift in focus from
skills to understanding. It was based on three elements:

Computer science (CS) — understand and apply the foundations of CS,

including abstraction, logic, algorithms, and data.
Information technology — analyse problems in computational terms and build
computer programs to solve problems.
Digital literacy — understand how to use information and communication
technology.

The new curriculum also gave schools the flexibility to develop it for their own
context.

Schools embraced the change differently. Some were fast to meet the targets,
others took tentative steps, and a few failed miserably. Then there were those that
placed too much emphasis on the new topics, neglecting the more foundational
computer skills.

The autonomy schools have means they are reliant on finding material themselves
so lessons can be delivered.

Numerous websites have popped up over the years, proving popular with
teachers. The National Centre for Computing Education (NCCE), which is funded
by the Department of Education (DfE), exists to support their computing skills and
subject knowledge at every level of compulsory education, plus sixth form.

One popular programme is the Teach Computing (TC) curriculum, featuring a

wealth of free resources, including lesson plans, slides, worksheets, homework,
and assessments.

In the next section, we’ll predominantly focus on this.

6
Computing
curriculum
structure
Computing curriculum structure
Let's look at how computing lessons are typically structured, and the material
covered from primary to secondary school.

Primary school
In 2013, the DfE published the national curriculum for key stages 1 and 2.

For both infants school year groups, the TC curriculum is structured into units
containing lessons. The order they’re taught in isn’t important, except for
programming, which follows a linear path.

Children are exposed to a variety of topics, including ‘Data and information’. In

year 1, this introduces them to grouping data, where they learn to put objects into
groups based on their properties, so they can be assigned labels and sorted.

8
Year 2 focuses on data collection methods, namely, tally charts and pictograms.
Children build on their knowledge of the previous year and learn about attributes
and the concept of less-than, more-than, and equal-to.

At this stage, there is no mention of using Excel specifically for any of the lessons.
However, Attech Edu has published a guide for introducing spreadsheets to
primary students.

They go on to suggest suitable activities for year 2–6 pupils.

In years 2 and 3, the aim is to teach children the basics of a spreadsheet. For
example:

What a cell, row, and column are.

How to navigate from one cell to another.
How to select and format a cell or range.

9
A Google Sheets treasure hunt template is provided. On opening, just one value is
visible, with B5 containing “Start Here - Go to J8”. The aim is to follow the
instructions and fill each cell with colour, so the text is visible.

After following instructions like “Go to F17”, “Go to A20”, and “Go to P2”, the final
destination is a cell with a URL leading to a Battleships game.

Another task is to get pupils to input a set of

colours as text and fill them correspondingly.

In year 4, the author suggests revisiting the table above and asking pupils to
generate visuals such as bar charts and pie charts. A class discussion can then take
place about which chart type is best and why.

With year 5, simple formulas and functions are introduced like =A2+B2, SUM and
AVERAGE.

10
 One task requires students to convert
a list of written calculations into
formulas. For example, 5 times 5 would
be =5*5 and 7 plus 2 would be =7+2.

Another task involves getting the pupils

to work in groups to watch traffic camera
footage from one of several locations,
and then to record how many vehicles
pass by and their type.

After a certain amount of time passes,

they then have to work out the total,
average, maximum, minimum, mode, and
median.

Year 6 combines the skills learnt in the

previous years to build a times table
quiz.

11
Across the five lessons, the skills involved are:

Using cells, columns, and rows.

Using the fill handle to copy down cells.
Central alignment.
Using single quotation to signify text.
Basic formulas.
Absolute cell references.
Number sentence formula.
Multiplication using asterisk symbol.
IF function.
Conditional formatting.
Hiding columns.
Nested functions.
Fill cells with colour.

Going back to the TC curriculum, for Key Stage 2, years 3–5 continue to explore
data, with branching databases, data logging, and flat-file databases all covered
over the three years for the ‘Data and information’ unit.

Year 6 is the first year that spreadsheets have a dedicated unit containing six
lessons.

The first lesson introduces pupils to spreadsheets, where they learn how to collect,
structure, and input data into a spreadsheet.

12
They go on to develop their understanding of cell references, data items and
formatting cells in lesson 2, while lesson 3 focuses on formulas and the difference
between text and numbers.

In lesson 4, learners are instructed to calculate data using the operations of

multiplication, subtraction, division, and addition.

Lesson 5 is based on planning and calculating the cost of an event, whereby pupils
have to construct appropriate formulas to answer questions.

The final lesson gets pupils to create charts, and then evaluate the results to answer
questions. They also need to show they understand when different charts should
be used.

13
Secondary school
Colne Park High School publishes its computing curriculum online for years seven
to 11.

Key Stage 3
The first two years focus on developing students’ knowledge and understanding of
a variety of industry-standard software, coding, and digital media.

– Year 7

In the first half of the year 7 spring term, seven lessons concentrate on Excel and
data-related topics:

Excel
Summarising Data
Charts
Databases
Validation
Searching & Sorting
Assessment

14
Each topic is a single lesson, so the material covered is likely to be introductory and
completed in Excel. The exception is databases; however, it’s not clear what
package is used, but Microsoft Access is most probable, given its ease of access.

– Year 8

Data Collection is the only real Excel-related topic that occurs in year 8.

– Year 9 ICT

In year 9, the school offers students Curriculum Enrichment for Excel and Word.
The website states: “You will have the chance to study ICT as part of Park’s
Curriculum Enrichment. You will learn how to use the functions of Microsoft Excel
and Microsoft Word. These two programs are used at GCSE level for writing
upcoursework and analysing data. The skills you learn will also help you in life after
you leave school.”

The purpose of enrichment is to provide extended learning opportunities to

students beyond the standard curriculum. Therefore, these lessons are typically a
step up in difficulty.

15
Key Stage 4 Computer Science
For the first two years, the school implements a Key Stage 3 curriculum. However,
to prepare students for the GCSE Computer Science curriculum, they are
introduced to Key Stage 4 material in year 9, covering programming and AI
concepts.

Year 10 and 11 build on this, as students further understand the ins and outs of
computer technology.

– Year 9

16
– Year 10

– Year 11

It’s clear that students are exposed to a large variety of topics throughout school,
with programming and AI taking centre stage at GCSE level. However, Excel only
features in years 7 and 9, and much of it is rudimentary.

There is no evidence that aspects like PivotTables, Power Query, and VBA are
covered in any lesson.

17
Panel discussion:
‘Excel in education’
Panel discussion: ‘Excel in
education’

Day 1 of Global Excel Summit 2023 welcomed host Matthew Bernath and several
panelists to discuss the importance of children learning Excel in schools to prepare
for the workplace:

Cheri Bortleson — Microsoft Education Program Manager for Excel

Steve Kraynak — Microsoft Senior Product Manager for Excel
Chris Dutton — Founder and Chief Product Officer at Maven Analytics
Jason Clarke — Vice President of Pleasant Solutions (parent of Sheetcast)

Cheri Bortleson recently joined Microsoft to advance its Hacking STEM program in
K-12 education, starting as early as elementary school.

Hacking STEM teaches STEM (Science, Technology, Engineering, and

Mathematics)

19
concepts such as data analysis, coding, and robotics through a series of hands-on,
project-based learning activities based on real-world challenges. It primarily
focuses on Excel, although other software like PowerPoint, OneNote, and even
Minecraft are used along the way too.

The mission is to empower children to solve real-world problems with hands-on

practical exercises that can prepare them to face an AI-dominant world.

K-12 refers to kindergarten (age 5–6) through twelfth grade

(age 17–18) in the United States and Canada education models.

In his role as a product manager at Microsoft, Steve Kraynak has been working
alongside Bortleson, combining his expertise in Excel with her background in
education. He revealed how together they are creating lesson plans that teachers
can “pick up and use”.

Kraynak acknowledged that creating these has not been without its technical
challenges, but the goal has always been to ensure they work seamlessly with Excel.

“I’m passionate about education. I’m a father of four and I wish my kids
knew more about Excel — honestly.” — Steve Kraynak

Maven Analytics founder Chris Dutton confessed: “Excel was sorely lacking in my
own education experience. In fact, no one taught me Excel formally through high
school or through my college experience. I think there’s a huge, huge gap there."

“Excel really is the best platform in the world for teaching core data
literacy skills — helping people speak the language of data.”
— Chris Dutton

20
Dutton’s company focuses on helping aspiring data professionals build
foundational analytics skills using Excel and other tools and programming languages
like Power BI, SQL, Tableau, and Python.

“It all starts with Excel,” Dutton acknowledged, and the program “still makes up a
large part of our course library at Maven”.

Dutton was also unconcerned about any diminishing importance Excel may suffer
from. “Even with the revolution of AI and machine learning, I don’t think that
replaces the need for these skills that Excel is so good at teaching. In fact, the
demand for Excel skills is only growing at this point.”

Jason Clarke is vice president of sales at Pleasant Solutions, the parent company of
Sheetcast, and is a long-standing figure on a school board.

“At our school board, we talk a lot about critical thinking, civil discourse and these
types of things. Civil discourse may seem odd to include in a conversation about
Excel, but just get a bunch of first graders to decide what colour theme should be
applied to a chart!”

Clarke also emphasised Excel’s importance as a general learning tool ahead of the
content itself.

“Content’s readily available everywhere. We’re all producing it. If you have a
connected device, you can search out content. But learning how to learn, learning
how to problem solve, learning how to think critically, and learning in ways that are
scalable — these are things that Excel just inherently brings to the table.”

He poignantly pointed out that “It’s a shame for anyone to go through an education
and not learn Excel,” and stressed the necessity of teaching a program that is
ubiquitous across the working world."

“There aren’t many office positions where you don’t touch Excel in
some way.” — Jason Clarke

21
Clarke elaborated on scalable learning, referring to Excel being the ideal tool for
starting with simple concepts and gradually building up to complex ones. This
approach allows children to develop a core foundation of knowledge and skills that
can be applied in a variety of contexts.

He suggested that by introducing complex concepts sooner at intellectually

appropriate levels, children would be better geared up for future challenges.

The example he gave was an Excel model that predicts the growth of a child’s
classmates, explaining that whilst they might find it difficult to grasp the model
itself, they can at least understand the inputs and outputs.

Clarke concluded his opening remarks by admitting: “Most kids aren’t interested in
rows, columns, spreadsheets, and financial analysis. They don’t even have money —
they don’t need financial analysis. But you can make it engaging by making the
subject matter relevant to them.

“Sheetcast allows you then to take it another step, where you can start sharing,
building, innovating, and creating on your own.”

Clarke’s points resonated with host Matthew Bernath, who highlighted Excel’s
strength for “learning other things”, comparing it to online course platforms that
teach a wide range of subjects in the same place. Bernath mentioned he had learnt
financial analysis and financial modelling in Excel.

He also raised concerns about engagement amongst young people, noting the rise
of social media apps like TikTok had shortened attention spans.

Bortleson assured that engagement is at the heart of Hacking STEM.

“Students collect their own data in real-time. They’re using Raspberry

Pi, they’re making their own models and they’re connecting multiple
sensors — and then they plug it into Excel.” — Cheri Bortleson

22
Furthermore, she highlighted the importance of understanding the connection
between sensors, small datasets, and big data — and how the last can be leveraged
in machine learning as part of its wider association with AI.

Bortleson believes the key is incorporating exercises based on students’ lived

experiences: “We have a really intentional progression, but it starts with personal,
local, and immediate.”

Kraynak acknowledged many educators may not be comfortable with Excel, so part
of his work alongside Bortleson has been to eradicate roadblocks so the session
plans can be picked up and delivered with ease.

Dutton echoed the others’ words and pinpointed engagement, tangibility, and
practicality playing a key part in Maven Analytics’ ethos.

“Everything we teach, we teach with a case method. So, you’re playing the role of a
hypothetical analyst for a company and you’re applying every skill that you’re
learning to some sort of real-world project that simulates the on-the-job
experience.

“We think that’s really important not just for keeping people engaged but for
helping them see how their skills can be applied in the real world.”

During the coronavirus pandemic, when many school and university students were
forced to partake in online learning from home, it opened up a conversation about
its impact on traditional education.

Dutton believes a healthy balance between the two is best: “I see a huge
opportunity to adopt a hybrid learning model. When we talk about traditional
academic education versus online, we tend to talk in extremes. Is online learning
going to replace the traditional university model?

“Realistically, I think there’s a lot of middle ground and a lot of room to capitalise on
the best of both worlds. This is something we’ve been highlighting recently at

23
Maven Analytics, where we’ve been working with educators to help them assess
their students’ skills. We’re building personalised learning plans, and we’re
introducing this hybrid model where we’re tying together asynchronous learning
with the live classroom experience.”

Dutton also recognises the flaws of a one-size-fits-all model: “Everyone learns in

different ways, everyone learns at their own pace, everyone’s starting from a
different point.

“The worst thing is putting everyone in the classroom through the same experience
and on the same timeline, as it runs the risk of isolating students who may need a
different type of learning experience.”

“What we love about this asynchronous model is that it allows individuals to study
asynchronously, build the skills that they need most at their own pace, and then
come together in the classroom to discuss, share their work, and help each other
grow.”

Dutton also predicted: “This is the model we will start seeing more and more of
moving forward.”

The next topic Bernath put to the panellists was accessibility, raising the point that
there is still “massive inequality in the world”, with some schools lacking basic
resources like electricity and computers.

24
There was unanimous support across the panel for democratising education, which
refers to making it accessible to everyone, regardless of their socioeconomic
background.

Bortleson said that she did acknowledge that the teacher preparation programs in
the US and other parts of the world don’t always provide enough exposure to tools
like Excel, which could hinder the pipeline of future educators who are equipped to
teach data literacy and computer science.

However, she added that Microsoft is committed to making its material free to
access, and Hacking STEM has deliberately been designed to be cost-effective,
increasing the programme’s global accessibility. Moreover, rather than replacing
classroom practices, Bortleson advocates finding ways to integrate them to
enhance existing ones.

Meanwhile, Clarke believes that Sheetcast has a big role to play in democratisation:
“You will have those who can create that do have access, but they can share with
those that don’t have access through the building of apps, so they can start to
engage with technology and concepts that are built with spreadsheets.”

“Everybody should have an opportunity to be inspired — whether they have access

to the underlying technology, tools, or resources. I think that’s where you need to
bridge the gap by pre-loading the content, the concepts, the learning, and then the
inspiration that comes along with that.”

“It doesn’t take much to spark inspiration in a child. Giving them access to a
Sheetcast app built in Excel, understanding the concepts and then seeing the
results — that’s an opportunity to say: ‘You know what? I want to figure out how to
get my hands on that technology so I can innovate and create my idea to change my
situation’.”

Before putting the next question to Kraynak, Bernath recognised the challenges
Microsoft faces, given Excel’s sizable and diverse user base. He noted that age,
ability, language, and disabilities like visual and hearing impairments were all
considerations, admitting he “had never thought about it before”.

25
Kraynak said Microsoft’s intention is to make all its education offerings work in Excel
for the web, which is free and can run on low-cost devices like Chromebooks. This is
to overcome the hurdle of not every school district having Windows laptops. He did
admit that some of the current ones require the desktop version, so there is still
work to be done on this.

On the subject of accessibility, Kraynak revealed it’s a passion of his and has
become a greater priority at Microsoft in the last decade thanks to CEO Satya
Nadella. However, he emphasised the amount of work involved to ensure all new
features are built with accessibility in mind from the start, including compatibility
with screen readers and other adaptive technologies.

After reading one of the comments, Bernath suggested an “ideal dataset” would be
good for students to learn from. Dutton, though, highlighted the importance of
working with real-world data, which is often messy, incomplete, and inaccurate.

“There are times when sharing a nice, clean, tidy dataset is the best way to teach a
specific skill,” Dutton asserted. “That said, in the real world, we don’t often get nice,
tidy, clean datasets to work with, so we try to focus on the real-world process of
cleaning, queueing, and prepping data for analysis.”

“If you’ve gone through a whole online course or program and all they’ve taught you
is how to aggregate metrics or do some basic exploratory analysis on a perfectly
formatted table, you’re in for a rude awakening when you land in the workforce and
you realise real data is a lot messier than that.”

The final question Bernath asked the panellists was about what they’d change about
how they were taught Excel and, more broadly, their education.

Clarke explained how there were certain moments of engagement and inspiration
that had a significant impact on his learning. He wishes the education system would
put greater emphasis on these rather than the content itself and believes
personalised learning holds the key to increasing engagement.

26
He also believes that Excel provides opportunities for critical thinking and problem-
solving — and recognises that inspecting data can change one’s perspective
quickly.

Clarke went on to say that one of Excel’s biggest strengths is instant feedback:
“I still to this day get great satisfaction out of hitting AutoSum!”

Addressing some of the comments in the chat facility, Dutton echoed the
sentiments of many about massively overestimating their knowledge of Excel: “If I
were to go back and change one thing about my education, it would be to make it
clear how powerful this program is.

Dutton said, “Excel is an incredibly sophisticated piece of software disguised as a

simple spreadsheet,” and referred to the Dunning-Kruger bias, where people with
minimal skills tend to overestimate their ability. “I’ve been there. I did the same thing
coming out of college.”

“I would have rated myself eight or nine out of 10, and then I was
humbled on the job when I realised I was probably closer to a three or a
four.” — Chris Dutton

“I think that’s a common pattern we see all the time. And as people start learning
and exploring Power Query, DAX, LAMBDAs, TypeScripts, and dynamic arrays —
they realise this is not just a simple spreadsheet, but this is an incredibly robust
analytical tool.”

Dutton noted there were about 750 million Excel users in the world but was adamant
that more than 99% of users are tapping into less than 1% of its functionality.

Reminiscing back to his college days, Kraynak recalled working on a non-Excel

project where he had a lot of creative freedom and praised his professor for
allowing it to be made personal to him.

27
The final word went to Bortleson, who was motivated by the obstacles that held her
back, wishing to erase implicit bias in STEM education: “My dad was a scientist, but I
was given really clear messages early on that math and science were not for me.

“I’m grateful that I’ve landed where I am, and I’m in an inclusive company and work
with a lot of people who share that mission around equity and inclusion.

“What’s exciting to me with this Excel community is to see the diversity and the
women because I didn’t see those women or girls when I was a kid, so I think that it’s
really critical as we seek to expand who is in this field and who’s good at using these
tools.”

Watch a full rerun of ‘Excel in education’ at https://youtu.be/GnGMUvHoMBA.

28
Poll results
Poll Results

In the build-up to the panel discussion, we put out a poll asking attendees:
“How much Excel did you cover at school?”

The results make for painful reading. Of

the 339 voters, 286 (84.4%) signalled
they learnt “very little” or “none at all",
whereas it was only 53 (15.6%) for “a
moderate amount” or “a lot”.

This is broadly in line with a poll we ran on

LinkedIn that asked the same question.

This time, 186 (89%) said they learnt “very

little” or “none at all”, with only 23 (11%)
saying “a moderate amount” or “a lot”.

It’s clear these results back up the

sentiments many have and indicate just
how underused Excel is in schools across
the globe.

30
Points of view
Points of view

Celia Alves
We asked Microsoft MVP Celia Alves for
her perspective, given she has experience
as a former teacher.

What is the best way to learn Excel?

The best way to learn Excel is by solving problems, preferably real problems,
meaning something related to the person’s life or job.

Are you aware of how Excel is currently taught in schools?

No, I am not. I was a teacher in Portugal for about 20 years but left that career 10
years ago. I have two kids studying in grade 9th and 12th in Canada. As far as I am
aware, Excel has not been taught to them, although I believe they have had the
opportunity to build a few charts on a spreadsheet for some assignment or school
activity.

In 2016, I studied the first year of a college Diploma program on Business

Administration. I had a unit about Excel in a course about Information Technology.
This course was taught online, following a textbook with simple examples and
exercises.

What Excel topics should be covered and how deeply?

The idea is that Excel is a modelling tool where values in cells are related by formulas,
which allow you to calculate the results of different scenarios.

How storing data in tabular layout makes calculations and data analysis so much

32
easier. The idea that data storage and reporting data and data visualization are
different things. And if you have your data in tabular layout, you can summarize it by
using pivot tables.

Using Excel tables make your work easier in many ways because it makes a lot of
procedures dynamic and with less probability of error.

Showing the potential of Excel with examples of automation using VBA, Power
Query, Office Scripts and Power Automate is important to make people aware of
what’s possible with this tool.

How important is Excel in the workplace?

Excel is used by most businesses and by almost every office professional. There are
companies running all their operations in Excel. Even when companies use other
programs for their operations, many times data is exported to Excel, where further
analysis is made. That’s how important Excel is.

Are there any other tools you believe should be added as part of the
school curriculum?
Programming tools and how to use AI with a critical sense.

33
Andrew Moss
(Global Excel Summit)
In the mid-1990s, I was in infant school (age 5–7). I
recall there being a shared computer in the corridor
that — if we were lucky — we'd each use for 20
minutes every week under the classroom
assistant's supervision.

Predictably, it consisted of typing up some activity in Word or squiggling about in

Paint. Back then, changing the font and underlining text was a big deal!

Aside from each classroom getting its own computer, not much changed
throughout junior school (age 7–11). Word processing remained the standard task,
although we definitely did it more frequently.

In secondary school (age 11–16), everything went up a few notches. We not only
used Word, but indulged in PowerPoint, Access, and yes…Excel.

How were these taught?

Paper handouts were very common. These were usually instructional guides with a
list of steps to follow.

It tended to be very toolbar and menubar-focused.

Click on this to do that.

Click on that to do this.
Here's what this does.
Here's what that does.

Homing in on Excel, very little was covered in five years. We created data grids and
discovered how to find the sum, average, and maximum and minimum number from

34
a range. Basically, all the things that AutoSum does for you automatically —
without requiring you to write a jot of formula code.

In sixth form (age 16–18), I remember building a cinema seating plan, which used
conditional formatting to colour-code ‘seats’ based on their availability, with each
cell containing 1 or 0.

I can’t think of many other tasks like that, though. Certainly, most of them were 40-
minute exercises to fill a lesson, and there’s only so much you can do in that time.

Some of the Access material was better, though, as it went a little deeper,
introducing us to tables, records, forms, queries, and data types.

I’m too old now to know what goes on in schools from within, but there’s no doubt
there have been positive changes to the computing curriculum.

However, I see no evidence that Excel is covered significantly more than when I
was there.

Kids should be exposed to nested functions, dynamic arrays, pivot tables, and
Power Query, with an emphasis on real-life scenarios.

Instead, they only discover what a VLOOKUP is when they get thrown into the big
wide world of work.

A higher baseline of Excel adeptness would mean a nation of better spreadsheets,

and an end to the stacks of error-ridden workbooks that plague companies.

One thing’s for sure — learning glorified data entry does not cut the mustard.

35
Conclusion
Conclusion
Excel is an essential tool in the business world, and its versatility means it is valuable
across a large range of roles, from finance and accounting to marketing and
customer service.

However, despite its importance, there remains a gaping chasm between what is
taught in education and what is practised in industry. This is a concerning trend, as
many children are leaving school or university unequipped to handle day-to-day
tasks that involve the program.

It’s promising that education systems have progressed in the last 20 years, from
focussing heavily on skills like word processing, creating presentations, and using
the web to understanding computer science concepts like programming languages
and algorithms.

Whilst this is a welcome change, concern remains that the more fundamental
aspects are being neglected due to assumptions made about the so-called basic
material.

Excel has a reputation for being a program anyone can pick up and use. However,
many people have a rude awakening when they realise their skills aren’t at the level
they thought they were. It’s not helped by its widespread availability and the blank
canvas users are presented with upon opening a new workbook, which can easily
trick people into having an inflated sense of confidence.

We posted about this on our social media channels last year, when we quoted Greek
philosopher and polymath Aristotle, who famously said something rather
memorable.

“The more you know, the more you know you don't know."
— Aristotle

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More broadly, core data literacy skills are best taught in Excel because of its user-
friendly interface. Manipulation tasks that involve slicing and dicing data and
filtering and sorting can easily be done without writing a single line of code.
However, creating formulas using Excel’s extensive range of 500+ functions
provide flexibility and powerful possibilities that go beyond what can be achieved
using the ribbon alone.

Schools must consider how they can incorporate Excel into their curriculums and
consider providing extra-curricular classes for students to learn Excel. Educators
must also be equipped sufficiently with the knowledge and resources to deliver
these sessions.

Programmes like Hacking STEM give them the opportunity to learn STEM concepts
through hands-on, project-based learning that heavily involves Excel. This is a step
in the right direction, but despite being accessible in over 100 countries,
widespread adoption remains to be seen.

In such a fast-moving world, it’s vital that children are prepared properly for a 21st-
century workforce, and it’s evident there is a lot more to do.

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