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In a settled period characterized by low rates of change there would be no need to scan the future. Yesterday's solutions would continue to fit today's problems and needs. However the late 20th century is a period of rapid structural change and social/cultural/environmental transformation. The future scenarios in prospect differ greatly from all previous historical experience. While there are many viable scenarios to aim for, many futures worth living in, others are less attractive and some spell the end of the human race as we know it. The single most important insight to emerge from the quality futures literature is that we must not drift passively into this period of profound civilizational challenge. Rather, we should look ahead with all the means at our disposal, interpret what we discover and integrate these understandings into the present in a continuous cycle or process (Ashley & Morrison, 1995).
All organizations must monitor their environment and adapt to changing
conditions. Schools are in a particularly exposed position because they
were created during the industrial period to serve the needs of that
timeÑto provide basic literacy and numeracy for an industrial society.
The culture of schools, teaching and education is therefore grounded in
the self-understandings of that earlier time and as a consequence they
assume a fairly static outlook. Unlike many commercial organizations,
schools, school systems and universities lack basic environmental
scanning and strategic direction-setting capacities. This means that the
institutions of formal education continue to be products of the past and
are failing to respond to the emerging picture of the near-term future.
This is a recipe for educational decline and social decay. It is not
possible for educational systems to fulfill their individual and social
functions so long as they remain based on past ideas, assumptions and
worldviews. They need to changeÑbut educators should be controlling and
directing the process (D. Snyder, 1996). At present, schools, and school
systems, are largely passive. They get caught up in responding to change,
in crisis management, because they do not take charge of the agenda.
There is a dearth of forward-looking leadership. But this can be developed.
Whatever else they are for, a major purpose of schools at the end of the 20th century is to prepare their students for active citizenship in the early 21st century. A working knowledge of the character of this time is therefore essential to the work of schools. The future cannot be predicted and there are no future facts. However, a coherent body of knowledge has emerged from futures studies and associated disciplines. This provides a structural overview of the coming decades. This overview is collective, not individual, and it evolves over time as historical events take place and our understanding develops. Such an overview is possible because of the work of countless people in many professions: people who detect signals, read trends, monitor change processes, study global problems, provide early warnings of future dangers and alert us to future opportunities. Futures studies interprets such material according to the standard rules of scholarship and offers the resulting insights to wider constituencies through books, journals, databases, Internet dialogues, workshops, seminars and conferences (R. Slaughter, 1996).
If schools and school systems were properly fulfilling their responsibilities they would not be waiting for futures workers to offer them help; they would be demanding it. However, not only do schools not routinely use futures tools and methods; in most cases they do not even know that they exist. So it is vital that college and school leaders bridge boundaries, move across the disciplines, facilitate cooperation between many different people, and find ways to develop school-based expertise in the area of futures studies. Only by so doing will schools be able to engage with the forward view and integrate the insights so gained into everyday practice. Since governments are absorbed by the demands of the immediate present and bureaucracies are preoccupied with the procedural necessities of system-maintenance, the vision and the capacity to look beyond the present can only arise from throughout the education profession itself: from principals, principalsÕ associations, cooperating schools, to college and university leaders and other professional groups.
The Futurescan technique is one way to begin to utilize futures expertise in education. Based on the QUEST method developed by Burt Nanus in the early 1980s, it is a low-tech method that employs several standard tools: SWOTs, brainstorming, cross-impact analysis, simple scenarios and the testing of strategies (Nanus, 1982). Futurescan has been used successfully in Australia in a range of contexts and organizations, including that of schools, colleges and universities. It provides a way for participants to detect signals of change in their own operational environment, to consider these carefully, and to evolve a range of strategic responses. It is a facilitated and systematic process that derives its core content from the knowledge of the participants. Hence it is a method that is inherently keyed to the perceptions, needs, and requirements of those using it.
The results of Futurescan emerge in terms of processes and products. For example, as a process it facilitates team-building, collegiality, and the development of futures-related skills. The products include an enhanced view of the dynamics of the present and near-future environment, a range of locally-significant strategic options and a first-run analysis of the consequences of implementing particular options. These process and product outputs are directly relevant to the framing and execution of a wide range of educational tasks, including policy formulation, local initiatives and projects, professional development, curriculum innovation, and proactive leadership.
The latter is particularly vital. While there are many cases of educational leadership in which clear gains have been made for a particular institution in competition with others, there is a great need for the kind of leadership which develops in the light of the global change process and the evolving picture of the near-term future. Such leadership will pursue quite different ends.
After 20 year's immersion in futures studies I find it indisputable that we cannot understand, or operate effectively within, the present without also understanding the futures that emerge from it. Therefore, the key shift that we should attempt to make during this time is one from unreflective immersion in a taken-for-granted present with its many hidden dangers, to a disciplined and deeply aware exploration of the wider spatial, temporal and cultural context. The latter embraces the near-term future, with its particular pattern of opportunities and dangers. The 200-year present is a useful device for framing this shift (Slaughter, 1995).
A combination of economic trends, emerging technologies, and complex social/cultural shifts means that the functions and roles of schools that became traditional within the industrial context and worldview are unlikely to persist unchanged and unchallenged. It is therefore to their own benefit to understand the driving forces within the international, national, and local environment, to discern the significance of these and other factors, and to find ways of integrating a range of new insights and practices into their modus operandi.
Schools are, and should remain, vital contexts for personal development,
socialization, and social cohesion into the distant future. However, I
doubt that they can implement adaptations and innovations based on the
push of the past or the pressures of present-day short-term politics. It
is up to educational leaders to develop new capacities and new functions
if schools and colleges are to prosper and thrive in the new millennium.
Hence they should begin to take on board some of the futures concepts,
tools and strategies that have been in wide use in other areas for some
years and bend them to their own socially vital needs. That choice
remains entirely possible in the late 1990s. But as time goes by, schools
and colleges that are unresponsive to the challenge will be superseded,
to our collective cost.
References
Ashley, W. & Morrison, J. Anticipatory Management, Leesburg, VA: Issue
Action Press, 1995.
Snyder, D. "High Tech and Higher Education: A Wave of Creative Destruction Is Rolling Toward the Halls of Academe." On the Horizon, 4 (5), September/October 1996, pp. 1-7.
Nanus, B. "QUESTQuick Environmental Scanning Technique." Long-Range Planning, 15 (2), 1982, pp. 39-45.
Slaughter, R. "Mapping the Future: Creating a Structural Overview of the Next 20 Years." Journal of Futures Studies, 1 (1), Nov. 1996, pp. 5-26.
Slaughter, R. The Foresight Principle, San Francisco: Praeger, 1995.
