What Have We Learned?

In "The Futurist Tells Stories," Donald Michael observes:

"Know thyself" is the most essential of all conditions for meaningful and responsible engagement when thinking about the future, for finding one's way among the claims, distortions, feelings, and fantasies that each of us harbors in our unconscious.1

Articles appearing in the Futures section of the Journal over the past several years exhort Extension professionals to orient efforts to the future and strengthen anticipatory skills. Michael likely would challenge us by asking: "What have we as Extension professionals learned along the way?"

The futures literature is replete with diverse techniques based on varied philosophies each of which can, under appropriate circumstances, provide helpful organizational direction. It's evident that each organization and, indeed, each individual will benefit differently from alternative approaches.2 Our ability to actively reflect on and learn from experiences with futures- oriented program development is key to our continued organization renewal. Vaill succinctly states the need:

Reflection is the capacity to "notice oneself noticing." Reflection, singly and in groups, is an absolutely crucial resource for understanding the nature of whatever...is coursing through the system.3

Example reflective questions might include: What experiences are we having with alternative futuring techniques? How are we meeting the knowledge and skill needs of paid and volunteer staff and community leaders for developing a futures perspective? Can we demonstrate greater program impact resulting from alternative program development techniques?

One way to strengthen our ability to be reflective is to examine the thoughts of others with parallel concerns. Elmandjra, in commenting on global needs for education, judges that:

Our learning systems are geared toward maintenance and pattern reproduction and are not at ease with dynamic processes. They must be transformed to make them socioculturally relevant and capable of facing the challenges that change has brought about. We need "innovative learning" instead of "maintenance learning." Innovative learning calls for two prerequisites: participation and anticipation.4

At face value, Extension has always emphasized "innovation" among audiences. But, have we truly framed our role as enabling innovative learning? What new approaches succeed in increasing participation in futures-oriented planning? What techniques are building our capacity to anticipate? What else is needed? Those are opportunities for reflection.

Barker, familiar to many Extension professionals for his video "Discovering the Future," itemized specific skills required for strategic exploration of the future:5

• Influence understanding-ability to understand what influences our perceptions.
• Divergent thinking-thinking skills necessary for finding more than one right answer.
• Convergent thinking-thinking skills that allow focused integration of the data and the prioritization of choices.
• Mapping-the capacity to draw pathways from the present to the future.
• Imaging-ability to picture in words or drawings what you found in your explorations.

Resources such as "Techniques for Futures Perspectives" in the Working with Our Publics series6 provide a rich repertoire of futuring approaches. Unfortunately, clear guidance for selecting among alternative techniques, based on a framework of individual and group skill development, is characteristically limited.

It's our hope this Journal section provides a forum for active reflection on our collective development of a futures perspective. We specifically invite articles on lessons learned in futures technique instruction and alternative program development approaches, along with diverse views of future educator roles to prompt healthy self-reflection. As noted futurist Marien7 observes:

Because of constant change in our world, a futurist's beliefs about the world should also be in flux-"lifelong learning" should mean more to a futurist than to any other profession.

1. D. N. Michael, "The Futurist Tells Stories," in What Have I Learned: Thinking About the Future Then and Now, M. Marien and L. Jennings, eds. (New York: Greenwood Press, 1987), p. 85.

2. J. F. Coates and J. Jarratt, What Futurists Believe (Mt. Airy, Maryland: Lomand, 1989) and D. Loye, The Knowable Future: A Psychology of Forecasting and Prophecy (New York: Wiley Press, 1978).

3. P. B. Vaill, Managing as a Performing Art: New Ideas for a World of Chaotic Change (San Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1989), pp. 30-31.

4. M. Elmandjra, "Learning Needs in a Changing World," Futurist, XXI (No. 2, 1987), 60.

5. J. Barker, Discovering the Future (St. Paul, Minnesota, I.L.I. Press, 1989), pp. 10-11.

6. J. D. Deschler and others, "Techniques for Futures Perspectives," Working with Our Publics, Module 7 (Raleigh: North Carolina State University, 1988).

7. M. Marien, "What Have I Learned," in What Have I Learned: Thinking About the Future Then and Now , M. Marien and L. Jennings, eds. (New York: Greenwood Press, 1987), p. 323.