Tapping Your Inner Futurist: Designing a 21st Century Roadmap for Libraries

Garry Golden, Futurist

Resources: www.garrygolden.com/NEKLS2014

PDF: http://www.garrygolden.com/wp-content/uploads/2014/04/NE-KS-Library-GarryGolden-FINAL-PDF-.pdf

Futurists look at leading indicators (not politics or culture) but in states (California), places, technology, etc.

No one is stepping up yet to systematically educate the population about digital literacy (it should be libraries) — We’re talking about social data; health data (fit bits; eating); lifelong learning data. We like to complain about privacy, but we need to get up to speed on this.

Elevate Social Norms: Digital Identify Management

• Owning Your Own Data (OYOD Policies) [like BYOD]
• Expand use of tools (Ghostery; Account Killer]
• Education and Advocacy for Opt-In [European Model] — establishes trust with people and also may allow for more enriching experience.

Micro-credentials — digital badging. Manufacturing Institute + Mozilla Badging

• How do we rethink the role of libraries in certifications of lifelong learning?
• We need to break down the skills that people know
• Open Badges

Digital Me: Moving toward portfolios and reputation — not just resume. 

• Teaching people who ask for help building a resume in a library, but then going beyond that
• Resume –> Portfolio –> Online Presence (managing identify; your network; what you’ve shared/posted)
• What stories are people telling the world through their online identity?

Word Gap

• 30 million word gap between high and low income families on the words kids hear age 0-3.
• Closing the Word Gap: Aligning Policy, Family Culture and Technology — libraries should own this.
• Trust factors/creepy line
• Your e-book is reading you WSJ

Will there be more or less change 2004-2014 vs 2014-2024? 

• Most everyone in the room thinks there will be more change
• Globalization; economy; middle class emergence around the world; Kansas needs to be delivering to the world
• Internet of Things: Devices communicate amongst themselves — books speaking to each other
• Openness of everything — citizen science; enlightened, scientific culture; more availability of tools
• Cheaper computers
• Health care and wellness — consumerization of health
• Population pyramid shift — aging society
• Education — skillset gaps; lifelong learning shift
• Institutions are changing — collaboration all over the place
• Less driving — Millennials especially; self-driving cars — shifting makeup of rural areas and cities.
• Food world — local food movement
• Natural resource constraints
• Language & Culture — Uniform language
• Gaps are also accelerated

So much will not change

• Books not going away
• Human creativity
• Desire for facetime
• Children & Storytime
• Reading for Pleasure
• Printed Books

People are more social and mobile than ever before — technology doesn’t dehumanize.

Libraries shifting from Access to Collections –> Outputs: Behavior Changed and Mastery of skills.

• Digitization threatens collection to some extent
• Challenge: are libraries in the business behavior change, culture shaping? Debate over this.

Future Studies: Sociology (Foresight 101; Drivers of Change, Place & Lifelong, Bringing it home)

Libraries as intersection of place and lifelong learning — place-based experiences

• Maker Space Trend — Why the Maker Movement Matters to America
• 3D Printing — additive manufacturing
• Students create robotic hand for boy
• What is the role of the design, tinkering, culture in libraries
• Library collection impact: printers; scanner; design build tools
• Minecraft
• Prototypes, Low Volume Builds — What role might libraries play in cultivating a Design-Maker Culture?
• Localization of manufacturing, food production, learning
• Make it @ your library — starts with events

Raise Expectations for Place-as-service: early childhood (libraries already there!); creative & active aging; 20-somethings, ’emerging adulthood’

• Creative aging environments — strategies: libraries & arts experiences; library teams + teaching artists; social experiences; full body — whole person; library collections: creativity focus
• Why Teaching Art in the Library Works 
• The way we engage an aging population is going to improve (libraries already do programming), but we will do more
• Engage — Tim Carpenter — Thrive as we age 
• Brain Fitness Trends
• New partners: teaching artists;
• Products & Collections: Lumosity; Brain Science Podcast; Brain Packpacks
• Products & Training Pathways: Wearables — Fitbits & Melons — people will be asking for help on these devices. Libraries providing access.

20-somethings ’emerging adulthood’ 

• Millennials Engaged in Civic Conversations
• TNT Basehor Community Library
• Alt+Library
• Escape the Room [not library, but cool] — must solve puzzles to get out of the room.
• How can libraries change their programming to meet this group where they’re at?
• Families, as well

Places to hold niche collections: art, audio, comedy, objects, time capsules, Tumblr blogs

Libraries & the future of lifelong learning

• Era of Apprenticeship –> disruptions of books & industrial work cycle –> Era of Institution [school especially] –> disruptions of web & knowledge economy –> Era of Learner (not teachers responsibility; but learners)
• Era of the Learner can be supported by schools. Learner is the 15-year-old; the 70-year-old
• MOOCs: Udemy; Coursera; Edx; Udacity; University Now
• Who could lead this effort? The library

Libraries build the local learning communities who build the MOOC

• Summer Reading
• Parents & Families
• Workforce Training
• Internal Training
• 21st Century Skills

Everyone has something to teach someone else. Problem to solve: Lack of learning communities. Build the base of community instructors. SkillShare

Coursmos — micro-content based. Not just theme and topic organization, but also how long it takes to finish something.

Culture Lag: Anonymous Web (portal for info) –> Social Web (social environment) –> Learning Environment

Are libraries in the business of information delivery? Connections? Behavior change? Getting better at things?

Lifelong Learning & The Personal Data Revolution.

Data is not end game. Data –> Knowledge –> Wisdom.

Connected Data = Insights & Wisdom

Experience API

Learning Graphs –> Learning Record Store –> Activity Streams –> Library delivers Adaptive Learning Experiences)

Learning Activity Streams — “I did this”

This allows library to create a greater experience for their users.

Library Experiences based on a learning map

Connected Experiences from Learning Graph — Map of My Ignorance: History of Jazz (Basic Level; In Progress; Expert Level)

“Every day I make an effort to move toward what I don’t understand.” –Yo-Yo Ma

Three times of people

1. I want to become a Futurist — socializing ideas; signals team
2. I want to encourage others (interesting) — intrapreneurial culture; lower barriers to pilots & partnerships; fail fare; risk-taking
3. I am not convinced by this snake oil salesman — show how futurist scenarios can be wrong; challenge these assumption; rally existing partners & stakeholders to return to golden era of libraries