School of International Futures, Next Generation Foresight Practitioners Special Award for North America

by Elizabeth Ononiwu

On Nov. 27, 2018, Maggie Greyson, 42, received recognition as one of the awardees of the Joseph Jaworski Next Generation Foresight Practitioners Award in 2018. 

The award which is developed by the School of International Futures was acknowledged in conjunction with the European Strategy and Policy Analysis System (ESPAS) conference in Brussels. Awardees were chosen from a group of 80 applicants from over 37 different nationalities.

According to the Next Generation Foresight Practitioners Award website, their aim for the award is to, “Create a global sensing-network of future-alert activists and to showcase innovative practice from around the world.”

As an awardee Maggie was invited to the The ESPAS conference in Belgium.  The three days of events in Brussels was an experience Greyson describes as “life changing”. 

Maggie's submission for the award is available in the video below. 

NGFP WINNERS 2018
PUPUL BISHT and 
OLUWABUNMI AJILORE

SPECIAL AWARDS 
NORTH AMERICA 
MAGGIE GREYSON
EUROPE 
CATHY MADGE
DEVELOPMENT  
EMILY EMPEL
SOUTH AMERICA  
ALINE ROLDAN
HUMANITARIAN 
DANIEL OLARTE
COMMUNITY
JUSTYNA KROL
JOINT EDUCATION 
ERICA BOL
INTERNATIONAL POLICY OZGE AYODOGAN
OCEANIA 
ELLIOT BRENNAN
NATIONAL/LOCAL POLICY 
JUAN MANUEL AVALOS 
ASIA 
VEERAPPAN SWAMINATHAN 

Following her receiving the award, Greyson was inspired by David Buwalda, to join together and start “Futures Present”, a foresight consultancy with the goal of helping people to practice long-term thinking. They are designing a collection of experiences to provoke people’s assumptions about the future and create visions of a future where they can play a part. Greyson hopes to inspire agency and choice in knowing that “the future belongs to everybody.”

While this conference helped equip Greyson for future success in her field as a futurist, it also opened her eyes to a pressing need in her global community. “At the ESPAS conference, foresight, future, and design were touched on very superficially in the presentations and panels with people high up in European governments,” Greyson said, adding that she believes there is a huge need for foresight, futures, and design methods to be incorporated into strategic planning at the national governmental level around the world.

With a Masters of Design (MDes) in Strategic Foresight and Innovation from OCAD University, Toronto, a Bachelor degree in Fine Arts from Concordia University, Montreal, Canada in Design for the Theatre, and a growing passion for applying design to futures work, this award gave Greyson, “a huge amount of confidence to keep going.”

For more information on the Joseph Jaworski Next Generation Foresight Practitioners Award and the other winners, click the link below.

https://nextgenforesight.org/awards.html