What future are we aiming at? This series of 6 posts, Future Vision 2025, describes some of my personal education mission milestones. These are not predictions, they are aspirational. They are framed as significant differences one could see or make by 2025. What’s noticeably different in 2025 when one examines students, parents, teachers, learning, assessment, media & society? How and when these milestones are reached are not addressed. Some milestones are indicated by the emergence of something ‘new’ (at least at robust scale), others by the fading away of something familiar and comfortable.
Media & Society 2025
A ubiquitous apocalyptic pessimism about man’s future on earth is less prevalent.
Some media is promoting a more nuanced appreciation of the complexity of real world problems, and the resultant need for complex and creative real world solutions. There is the beginning of respect for incremental continuous improvement. An alternative narrative to the silver bullet.
Medium-length publications in both text and video have appeared expressly to explain complexity. It’s fascinating: clever and interesting visualizations of tradeoffs in everyday topics like energy & environment, economics & equality, peace & politics.
Of course the media can only feature this content because it has become popular, drawing eyeballs for ads. Against all predictions of continued free-fall-dumb-down, ratings don’t lie: there is a significant and growing viewing market for complexity.
Meanwhile, the remaining bulk of people, viewing their normal demagoguery, fearmongering, silver bullet oversimplifications and empty promises are…starting to wonder why they feel cheated. Their heretofore implacable faith in paying attention only to their favored locked-in positions is showing some strain.
There’s a possibility of voters who expect their institutions to understand and deal with reality. A belief that effectiveness is possible in government is budding. A few visionary politicians are emboldened to propose more nuanced, more rational, more evidence-based and thus more effective policies and programs.
Jeopardy is finally dead and cancelled, due to low ratings. Intelligence is less conflated with fact lookup.
Problem-solving is recognized as more entertaining – fake repetitive manufactured-drama fail-fests like “the Bachelor” being crowded by more creative maker shows like “Project Runway”. Sports fans enjoy learning the sophisticated “patterns” in their favorite sport through pattern overlays on live matches.
It’s the beginning of the end of 7 decades of narcotic numbing of the masses.
Coulson on EdTech Evaluation 