Cones of uncertainty around BSF
Having permission to tell stories about possible futures – especially stories created around shared prompts – enables the sharing of ideals, aims and aspirations that can lead to better understanding of nearer term actions. But there is particular value in longer term futures work (such as the Beyond Current Horizons programme) in helping to create richer short term strategies for change.
Long term futures work is not about predicting the future, but systematically investigating a range of futures so that short term actions are more informed about possible, probable and (through discussion) preferable futures. This systematic investigation is about understanding current and historic data, looking at trends and considering how those trends may develop. The forecaster Paul Saffo says that it is not predictions, but about mapping the ‘cones of uncertainty‘. As Saffo explains, uncertainty is cone-shaped because as you project further into the future there are more surprises. The longer the term the more uncertain or the less specific you can be.
Take your own work. You can be pretty accurate in statement one of what you will be doing in the next 10 seconds; statement two of what you will be doing in 10 minutes might have a little more uncertainty – the phone might ring, your coffee cup needs refilling or you’re back on facebook again. (Was your statement one right by the way?) 10 days time – your diary may suggest something but you can be less confident that it is 100% accurate, and the further you go, the more uncertainty there is. 10 weeks, 10 months, 10 years, the range of possible futures on the extremes of the cone become further from one another.
But BSF is about building the appropriate spaces for learning for the potentially the next 50 years. The level of investment in such infrastructure will surely not be around at this level again before that – so how can we ensure that the decisions being taken now will be relevant to the range of possible functions, learners and aims that the institutions may need to be cater for?
The answer, of course, is that we can’t. We can’t be certain that today’s decision is appropriate for tomorrow’s needs – there are too many factors that influence education: it’s expected role in society; numbers of pupils; types of learners; the aims of education; sorts of resources etc etc. But what we can do, is ensure that the decisions we make are as informed as possible. That we’ve investigated as wide a range of possible futures as possible to ensure that, not only are we prepared for a whole range of possibilities, but that we are actively working towards the preferable future that we want.
The Beyond Current Horizons programme is attempting to look at these long term possible, probable and preferable futures. The BCH blog is the scrapbook of developments that may be useful to provide insight into some things that may challenge the way in which we currently think about education (in terms of its aims, processes etc). Towards the end of March 2008 there will be a large collection of data and analysis, tools, and future scenarios that will also be of use in helping to inform more immediate decisions and strategies.
Long term futures work is about making visible some of the possible futures, detailing the cones of uncertainty, so that from longer term visioning and systematic thinking, we can develop richer and more informed nearer term visions, near term strategies and more appropriate immediate actions. By telling stories of our preferable futures, we can begin to ensure that our immediate actions go to creating and shaping the future that we want. To become involved in BCH please contact me or sign up to the blog and newsletter – all involvement is welcome. After all, the more informed our thinking can be, the better our use of the incredible resources of BSF.
February 10th, 2009 at 8:09 pm
While you make an interesting point about cones of uncertainty, it seems that you fail to follow it through to a logical conclusion: if we assume that uncertainty increases into the future then it would be rational to develop schools via less rigid, shorter-term plans. Being aware of the many technological/pedagogical possibilities along the way is equally as easy and schools and local authorities wouldn’t be taken into the future on a runaway train of unsuitable contracts.
Clearly this is very far removed from the BSF vision which mandates huge, unwieldy building projects allied with restrictive, inflexible, overpriced ICT outsourcing. What’s more, technological expertise is largely dissolved from the core of the school as technical staff are outsourced, so awareness of future technologies is likely to be significantly limited. School staff will have no “experts” to consult and technological development will stagnate.
Provide the money and allow schools freedom to innovate and success will follow. Tie them up in the straitjacket of government vision documents and protracted procurement procedures and we will have nothing to show for the £10bns of investment.
February 16th, 2009 at 1:15 pm
There’s a raft of Futurelab publications that agree with many of the approaches you highlight – most recently http://www.futurelab.org.uk/resources/documents/handbooks/innovation_handbook.pdf
However – the aim of this programme is to look at a range of possible futures and to present them to those whose role it is to make longer term investments – head teachers, policy makers, ’system leaders’ etc. If the outcome of that is more distributed/flexible action then that links with your viewpoint. Whatever the scale of investment though, being able to systematically think about future possibilities to inform decision making is really important.