Teach the Future (TTF) has developed a paradigm shifting curriculum by introducing futures thinking and practices to students and educators. Thirty years ago, Peter Bishop developed a curriculum to teach futures thinking to students before they entered higher education. Predicated on the belief that “the future can be influenced by individual choices and actions,” the program has spread throughout schools around the globe.
Much has changed within the last thirty years. Advancements in technology, finance, health care, transportation, and communications have expanded exponentially. However, the complexities of global crises in climate, epidemiology, democratic governance, cybersecurity, and diplomacy, have intensified historic hegemonies.
These crises have been classified by governments and global planetary organizations as volatile, uncertain, complex, and ambiguous (VUCA) such that the United Nations has issued sustainable development goals through 2030.
Many factors, many challenges
The Anthropocene has given primacy to humans at the expense of the natural resources, and animals that sustain us. Political ideologies have divided nations that were previously described as democratic. Social and economic policies have created unprecedented barriers to basic needs among middle and low income families. These are but a few of the myriad, multifaceted, muti-leveled, and interconnected challenges today’s students will inherit unless they define and design new and different futures. But with no systemic way of instituting the TTF curriculum throughout primary and secondary schooling, will enough students be prepared to live in sustainable (and generative) futures?
There is a case to be made for integrating futures thinking and strategic foresight into education leadership training and development. Programming that engages education system leaders and policymakers with futures consciousness would ensure holistic and systemic benefits of embracing futures thinking. Likewise, there needs to be a thorough diagnostic of how primary and secondary education systems not only fail to prepare students for future life, work, and planetary concerns, but also perpetuate the same social and political hegemonies that existed when these school systems were designed.
A wider-deeper-longer perspective
In their 2010 JFS article, (Bishop & Strong, 2010) stated, “To teach the future means helping students develop a wider-deeper-longer perspective.” The TTF curriculum is designed to prepare students to consider alternative futures of the world. Students are acknowledged as global citizens and active contributors to society now instead of at some future time when they are gainfully employed or hold leadership positions. Young people are taught how to consider the VUCA issues of the present and invited to co-create preferred futures using their knowledge and diverse experiences, imaginations, and aspirations.
TTF helps students build confidence and self-efficacy and view themselves as decision makers and leaders. Students are encouraged to investigate systems at multiple levels and to envision the world differently than they have come to know it.
After the futures literacy course
However, what happens after students are introduced to futures thinking? How do they integrate this new perspective with other classes, particularly in traditional schools? Many schools are still perpetuating binary, right or wrong, grades-based approaches to assess student achievement. Unfortunately, because futures thinking isn’t embedded throughout the education landscape, students’ self-agency could be encumbered as they move on from classes where TTF is taught to classes or schools that have yet to be exposed to or embrace futures concepts.
Many schools continue to be concerned with “the right answer” and do not encourage the engagement of students’ imaginations, aspirations, anticipations, or diverse experiences as an approach to problem solving and decision making. This lack of futures consciousness can be extremely frustrating to students who feel hindered by traditional curricula or teaching practices.
Benefits of futures conscious education leaders
While not all district leaders will acknowledge the value of engaging futures thinking and foresight, I have served with and conversed with several who were open to the endeavor. I interviewed school systems' leaders located throughout the United States and Western Canada who were working toward creating more equity within their districts. I asked them to envision their school districts ten years in the future and to consider four scenarios of change from no change to radical change. These leaders expressed gratitude for the opportunity to expand their thinking beyond the daily issues and unprecedented crisis due to COVID-19 to play with alternative visions of their districts.
What could school systems that promote creativity and imagination from pre-kindergarten through the secondary grades allow students to accomplish? Instead of maintaining traditional grade structures, schools could be redesigned to support the individual learning needs of students. Equipped with a deeper understanding of their own futures consciousness, district leaders and policymakers would be compelled to ensure that all educators and students learn more about futures and how to use foresight concepts and methods to co-create emancipated futures.
This shift in perspective would also strengthen the learning relationships between teachers and students as they explore alternative futures together. Moreover, schools could invite experts from different fields to demonstrate how students can use foresight tools to analyze complex problems and consider alternative futures.
To ensure that students are prepared to co-create the world they want to live in over the next thirty years, and not merely react to the effects of historical decisions, school districts and education policies must support the development of futures consciousness. Scaling the TTF curricula to school system leaders and policymakers would ensure a better chance for students to engage with alternative futures and promote planetary thriving.
References
Appadurai, A. (2013). The future as cultural fact: Essays on the global condition. Verso
Bishop, P. C., & Strong, K. E. (2010). Why teach the future? Journal of Futures Studies, 14(4)
Epps, Z. (2022). School district leaders as agents of equity and public education futures. Journal of Futures Studies (Digital Edition). https://jfsdigital.org/2022-2/vol-27-no-1-september-2022/school-district-leaders-as-agents-of-equity-and-public-education-futures/
Freire, P. (1993). Pedagogy of the oppressed: New revised 20th anniversary edition. Continuum.
Zhao, Y. (2009). Catching up or leading the way: American education in the age of globalization. ASCD.