Future Learning Design Podcast

Manish Jain is a visionary educator and co-founder of Shikshantar and Swaraj University in India, dedicated to transforming traditional educational paradigms. He discusses the necessity of unlearning systemic biases ingrained in education and advocates for fostering independent, community-oriented learning. Jain highlights innovative concepts like Ecoversities, which celebrate local knowledge and emphasize experiential learning. He also urges a shift away from conventional schooling methods that undermine self-worth and creativity, promoting a more holistic approach to education.

Join Vanessa Terschluse, a sustainability advocate, Nolita Mvunelo, a champion for youth empowerment, and Matías Lara, a systems change expert from Argentina, as they dive into the vital role of young people in driving systemic change. They discuss the power of community collaboration and the necessity of educational reform to equip youth for today's challenges. The trio also highlights storytelling's impact in connecting individuals to urgent issues, and they inspire a collective youth movement toward meaningful transformation.

Alex Beard, Senior Director at Teach For All, explores the complexities of education worldwide, stressing the need for alignment with community values. He discusses the tension between structured and project-based learning, advocating for diverse educational approaches to foster collaboration over competition. Beard delves into lifelong learning, emphasizing how relational dynamics shape meaningful outcomes. He also reflects on the implications of AI in education, cautioning against its use without a shared vision for purposeful integration.

Otto Scharmer, a Senior Lecturer at MIT and Founding Chair of the Presencing Institute, shares profound insights on education's role in societal transformation. He discusses overcoming the 'illusion of insignificance,' empowering individuals to drive collective change against climate and inequality. Scharmer emphasizes the need for deep relational ties in social movements and critiques traditional educational frameworks. He champions embodied learning, suggesting that a supportive 'social soil' fosters creativity and engagement crucial for the leaders of tomorrow.

With the so many prevailing stories of uncertainty around for everyone, our roles as educators supporting young people and colleagues to know how to navigate it can be overwhelming! As Thea Snow said on a recent episode, feeling safe in uncertainty is hard. But this is where perhaps we can all learn from the wisdom of those with expertise in futures work and facilitating spaces to explore desirable regenerative futures. Bill Sharpe (http://www.billsharpe.uk/) is one such expert, who has been helping teams in all sectors of organisations and society find co-ordinated ways of managing innovation, creating transformational change that has a chance of succeeding, and ways of seeing the future in the present. He developed the adapted version of the Three Horizons framework as a method for futures studies and practice with Anthony Hodgson, Andrew Curry and Graham Leicester.Bill was previously a Research Director at Hewlett-Packard's corporate labs in Bristol, UK. He joined HP Laboratories in 1985, becoming one of the first HP Laboratory Directors outside the US. Early work in Bristol provided the impetus for him to set up the Personal Systems Lab that led HP's early work in the emerging world of smart consumer products, mobile computing and digital imaging. Bill then took an assignment in the USA for two years to lead the Internet Solutions Operation of HP's Laserjet Bueiness through the transition to Web. Back in Bristol, Bill set up new mechanisms for coupling HP Labs to the creation of HP's new information appliance businesses. This work led him to co-found the Appliance Studio in 1999 as an independent company, delivering innovation to a wider commercial audience. Having created a range of new product ideas for clients, in particular new business in digital signage for Steelcase Inc, the Studio launched its own start-up Lucid Signs. With the sale of Lucid Signs, Bill moved on to focus entirely on personal research and consulting. Early in his career, Bill took an active role in UK government research through his work with the Science and Engineering Research Council (SERC) and Advanced IT (Alvey) programs. As a member of the Programme Directorate at Alvey - a programme designed to foster R&D between industry and academia - Bill co-coordinated research into intelligent knowledge-based systems.Bill is a highly accomplished practitioner in futures techniques and systems change, and now works with Future Stewards (https://futurestewards.com/), the International Futures Forum (https://www.internationalfuturesforum.com/) and H3Uni (https://www.h3uni.org/) to pioneer new approaches to futures, systems thinking, and transformative innovation. He is the author of Three Horizons: The Patterning of Hope (https://www.triarchypress.net/three-horizons.html) and Economies of Life: Patterns of Health and Wealth (https://www.triarchypress.net/economies-of-life.html).Additional info about Three horizons: A pathways practice for transformation - Three Horizons is a simple and intuitive framework for thinking about the future. The framework explains how people often manage to disagree so violently about their visions of the future and how to achieve them - and it offers a practical way to begin constructive conversations about the future at home, in organisations and in society at large. The three horizons are about much, much more than simply stretching our thinking to embrace the short, medium and long term. They offer a co-ordinated way of managing innovation, a way of creating transformational change that has a chance of succeeding, a way of dealing with uncertainty and a way of seeing the future in the present.Kate Raworth's excellent description of 3H: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_5KfRQJqpPUJonathan Rowson's great explanation of the H2 minus vortex: https://perspecteeva.substack.com/p/deactivating-the-h2minus-vortex Social LinksLinkedIn: @bill-sharpe - https://www.linkedin.com/in/bill-sharpe-6689

As you will have heard on many previous episodes of the podcast, with Marie Battiste, Carl Mika, Wakanyi Hoffman, Vanessa Andreotti and others, understanding the ways in which our colonial schooling systems have propogated one particular way of knowing our world, and excluded and often violently suppressed many others is something that I care deeply about. For me, it has to be a key part of any transformative work that we do to, with humility and curiosity, to reorient education systems. But in order to do this, we need people who are able to gather and convene the critical conversations that put these ways of knowing in dialogue with each other. It is therefore the greatest honour to have Professor Catherine Odora Hoppers joining me on the podcast this week. For her entire career Dr Hoppers has been at the forefront of facilitating these vital conversations. In post-Apartheid South Africa, she designed and enabled the process that led to the first national policy on the recognition, development and protection of indigenous knowledge systems. Professor Catherine Odora Hoppers is a scholar and policy specialist on International Development, education, North-South questions, disarmament, peace, and human security. She is a UNESCO expert in basic education, lifelong learning, information systems and on Science and Society; an expert in disarmament at the UN Department of Disarmament Affairs; an expert to the World Economic Forum on benefit sharing and value addition protocols; and the World Intellectual Property Organisation on traditional knowledge and community intellectual property rights.She got a Masters and PhD in International Education from Stockholm University, Sweden. In South Africa, Professor Hoppers was awarded Professor Extraordinarius in 2019 at University of South Africa (Pretoria). She held a South African Research Chair in Development Education at the University of South Africa (2008-2018). Prior to that, she was a technical adviser on Indigenous Knowledge Systems to the Parliamentary Portfolio Committee on Arts, Culture, Science and Technology (South Africa) and led the Task Team to draft the national policy on Indigenous Knowledge Systems. She is a member of the Academy of Science of South Africa (ASSAf, 2002), and was a member of the Academy of Science Special Panel on the Future of Humanities (South Africa).She was the Goodwill Ambassador for Makerere University in Kampala Uganda; and Ambassador for Non-Violence at the Durban Universities’ International Centre for Non-Violence. In July 2015, she received the Nelson Mandela Distinguished Africanist Award from HE Thabo Mbeki for her pursuit of the total liberation for the African continent through the promotion of Indigenous Knowledge Systems of Education and in the same year, Prof Hoppers was awarded “Woman of the Year” by the University of South Africa, and was named as a “Leading Educationist” and was honoured in the Gallery of Leadership as the 63 most influential people who have shaped Unisa since its inception in 1873, in a permanent exhibition in Kgorong Building in UNISA. In 2017, Professor Hoppers received the distinction from UNESCO as an Honorary Fellow in Lifelong learning. She is the Founder and Director, Global Institute for Applied Governance in Science, Knowledge Systems and Innovations (https://www.giagsi-ug.org/the-faculty/). She held a Professorship in Education at Gulu University (Uganda) and is now the Canada Research Chair in Transdisciplinarity, Cognitive Justice and Education as part of the Pluralism Strategy Initiative at the University of Calgary (https://www.ucalgary.ca/pluralism/scholars-educators-researchers).She is the author of many important works including the book, Rethinking Thinking: Modernity's "other" and the Transformation of the University with the late Prof. Howard Richards.https://scholar.google.com/citations?user=qWEKG-QAAAAJ&hl=en

In this engaging discussion, Dr. Roland Kupers, a global advisor on complexity and resilience, argues for the essential inclusion of complexity sciences in education. He critiques traditional reductionist teaching methods and highlights their limitations in addressing modern challenges. The conversation touches on the importance of equipping young people with the skills to navigate complex societal and environmental issues. Kupers also discusses how societal norms shape behavior, using solar panel adoption as an example, and advocates for innovative educational frameworks to inspire deeper learning.

Zineb Mouhyi, co-founder of YouthXYouth and The Weaving Lab, works tirelessly to revolutionize education by centering young voices. She discusses how the COVID-19 pandemic has inspired youth globally to reimagine their learning experiences. Zineb emphasizes the importance of bridging generational gaps, advocating for collaboration between young activists and their elders. The conversation highlights the transformative potential of community relationships and hopefulness in dismantling outdated educational structures.

Thea Snow, Regional Director for Australia and Aotearoa New Zealand at the Centre for Public Impact, and Toby Lowe, Professor of Public Management, discuss the adoption of Human Learning Systems in organizations. They delve into the frustrating disconnect between political promises and real-world complexities. The duo emphasizes the power of storytelling in navigating uncertainties and the importance of fostering environments of belonging within organizations. Their insights highlight the need for collaborative governance that prioritizes relationships and continuous learning.

In this engaging discussion, Miguel Segundo-Ortin and Vicente Raja, both postdoctoral researchers from the University of Murcia, delve into ecological psychology and its transformative potential for education. They argue that traditional learning environments often constrict exploration, while ecological psychology encourages sensory-rich interactions with surroundings. The duo highlights the intertwined nature of perception and action, the importance of agency in learning, and the need for educators to embrace the complexities of human experience, drawing from the legacies of psychological pioneers like Eleanor Gibson.