What is a Learning Futurist? — from Teaching College Math by Maria Andersen
So, what is a futurist? First, a futurist does not “predict” the future, they use foresight skills to complement insight and hindsight. One foresight skill is basic forecasting (trend analysis), but this only works if the field under investigation is relatively stable. In unstable fields, futurists use scenario planning to project several possible outcomes – by examining the possibilities, an organization can plan for the most common outcomes, or at least think through some of the planning necessary for extreme possibilities (often, several extreme possibilities have some commonalities). Futurists have to think creatively about the direction and meaning of trends, not just within a field, but in the surrounding fields. You could say that Futurists have to be excellent systems thinkers.
Who does futuring?…
So, what is a Learning Futurist, in particular?…