The themes I am working with in my upcoming speculative futures paper look at the predicted impacts to my rural post secondary institution as Canada takes steps to mitigate climate change. I consider myself a hopeful cynic. As this is a paper for an external audience I want to remain hopeful so that we can perhaps inspire change and build community and action around these hopeful futures but I should also say I am internally quite cynical about our ability to mitigate climate change impacts. It is easy to fall into despair. I appreciate that imagining the future of my college creates some hope and perhaps action so thank you George for assigning this. I am attempting to focus on colleges in BC with this paper.

Regulation of planned obsolescence
In 2017 France began passing laws that will reduce the ability of tech companies to engage in planned obsolescence (Young, N. 2021) and I am hopeful we will see worldwide adoption of this practice as we look towards building circular economies, protecting consumers and reducing the high turnover of hardware technology companies uphold with these practices. I consider that small post secondary institutions will be able to better plan for their needs, but costs would likely increase. To mitigate the increased costs I am considering that we may see buying consortiums increase for small institutions and this may result in post secondary institutions looking more similar in terms of technology and hardware across BC.

Measuring Impacts
I also think that metrics will be taken more seriously, we will see public institutions move from being required to measure their emissions (they already have this in place minimally) to moving into zero impact to then measuring how organizations contribute to living systems or measuring regenerative efforts (Raworth, K. 2017).

Wasteful Space
From the requirements to measure we will see changes in how we manage college physical spaces.  It is not uncommon for colleges in BC to have multiple campuses. A main campus and then satellite campuses in the region. I predict that we will see satellite campuses use their spaces for multiple purposes in the community or close entirely as requirements for measuring emissions from operations come into effect, our ability to work online becomes more trusted and common and we continue to offer better designed online learning opportunities and blended models for learning post pandemic.

Required Sustainable Learning
I also consider how learning will change when we take the UN sustainable development goals more seriously and implement learning about sustainability across disciplines throughout post secondary education. Every discipline and graduate will have a requirement to have completed sustainable studies. By 2030 I can see this moving from deliver and test model to learners contributing to the open knowledge commons about the territories they reside in, how to steward the places they reside in with sustainable solutions and innovation targeting sustainable design. Beyond 2030 I can see these requirements evolving to contributing to the knowledge commons and not just sustainable but also regenerative design. are going to be called upon to train workers to shift to new industries away from fossil fuels and towards sustainable and regenerative design.

Labour Market Shifts
The largest impact to my college is likely the training we will need to provide as labour market demands shift. Displaced workers will require training. Without careful consideration of labour demands I do believe no matter how hopeful we are, that a backlash could take place from the labour market without proper income supports from people who are experiencing changes to their employment due to implementing regulation of emissions. Universal Basic Income and the four day work week are both pieces that should likely be implemented to support labour changes as well as training opportunities for rising industries.

 

References:

Caird, S. and Roy, R. (2019). Higher Education Systems. In: Leal Filho, W. ed. Encyclopaedia of Sustainability and Higher Education. Springer, Cham.
http://dx.doi.org/doi:10.1007/978-3-319-63951-2_261-1

Edstrand, Emma. (2016). Making the invisible visible: how students make use of carbon footprint calculator in environmental education. Learning, Media and Technology, 41:2, 416-436,
DOI: 10.1080/17439884.2015.1032976

Raworth, K. (2017). Doughnut Economics – 7 ways to think like a 21st century economist. Vermont.

Young, N. (June 30, 2021). The Spark Guide to Civilization – Episode 6 Obsolescence. Spark with Nora Young. CBC Radio.
https://www.cbc.ca/listen/live-radio/1-55-spark/clip/15852633-the-spark-guide-civilization-ep-6-obsolescence?share=true