Co-creative futures of CAU campus for Community Wealth Building
How can futuring methods help imagine the implementation of transformation models?
How can futuring methods help imagine the implementation of transformation models?
In a co-creative process, we guided a group of students from Christian-Albrechts-University (CAU) in Kiel through futures thinking and strategic design methods. We worked to make the transformation model of Community Wealth Building (CWB) more tangible by exploring its futures on campus.
- 3 co-creation sessionsThe course was structured in three sessions in which students explored CWB through different futuring methods.
- 10 news of the futureEach student wrote a news article placed in a future CAU campus in which CWB had been successfully implemented.
- 1 future student newspaperThe future news articles were compiled into a fully layouted and printed newspaper of the future.
- 1 exhibitionThe collectively created newspaper from the future was then exhibited as part of the 2024 edition of Waterkant Festival.
A common challenge in transformation models is the shift from the abstract to the tangible. Ideas fail in their ability to provide concrete examples of their implementation and these are essential for their advancement. In this course, we use futuring methods to make the CWB model tangible. Through the development of scenarios and creative world-building activities, we exercised our imagination and reached concrete examples of the implementation of this sometimes abstract proposal.
Three co-creative sessions
1
Futures, in plural
In the first session, we guided students through a playful introduction into the multiplicity of futures and the "possibility space".
2
Building alternative worlds
In the second session, we accompanied the group in a step-by-step process to develop and visualise tangible future worlds.
3
Telling stories from the future
In the third session, we worked on stories and accompanying images that convey a narrative, from the imagined future worlds to engage visitors of Waterkant Festival.
Main Outcomes
- Tangible futuresThe students used different futuring tools to make an abstract theory about social transformation more tangible.
- Futures LiteracyThe group practised their imagination and their ability to 'think in plural futures'.
- Printed outputA co-created newspaper of the future depicting stories about CWB on campus, exhibited at Waterkant Festival.
Tools & Methods
-
Futures literacyFutures literacy describes the ability to utilise futures in the present, harnessing complexity for decision-making. -
Scenario methodsA range of methods aimed at creating distinct scenarios for informational, creative or strategic purposes. -
Future(s) personaA tool to better understand stakeholders that might emerge as part of a particular future. -
News of the futureAn approach to use bold and concise future news headlines to make a specific future more tangible for the audience. -
StorytellingThe art of conveying a narrative through words, images or sounds, to engage and captivate an audience and inform, entertain, or inspire. -
World BuildingA method that uses different ideation prompts to imagine one or more alternative detailed future worlds.
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