WORLD FUTURE SOCIETY
HIGH SCHOOL
ESSAY CONTEST

As you look ahead to the years after high school, one of the biggest challenges is anticipating what kind of world will be waiting for you, especially as you enter the workplace or decide what sort of career to pursue. What skills and knowledge are going to be the most valuable to you in a job or career? What areas should you concentrate on in college? What job areas will have the most opportunities in five years? In ten years? These are all important personal questions that make this essay contest very relevant to your own future.

The world around us is becoming an increasingly complex place, with changes occurring at an accelerating pace, but it is also an exciting one, especially when you begin to understand what is happening and why. One way to make some sense of the dizzying environment we live in is to identify trends in the world around us. Another way to say this is to describe how a specific change or set of changes is occurring: How fast, in what direction, and with what consequences?  When we talk about consequences, we really mean: What might the world look like as a result of this change?

Of course, no one can really predict the future, but we can think about more-likely and less-likely possibilities and prepare for the most likely. We can also examine changes that might influence other things, such as how the Internet might make it easier to do homework. And we can look at what is most interesting about the future: how it might change your own life and the lives of others in your school, family, community, or even country.

Pick an area of focus from the topics listed below in the rules. Describe those trends you want to talk about in your essay in your own words, including what changes you expect to occur and what the consequences might be for the lives of people affected by the trends you describe. Use as much detail as you feel is necessary to make the description easy to understand and meaningful to its readers. Remember that you are describing change in the real world and not a world of fiction, so do some research about how change actually occurs in the area or areas you have chosen, and include these research citations with the paper.

Submit an original work in English on TRENDS IN ONE OF THE FOLLOWING SIX sectors: TECHNOLOGY, ENVIRONMENT, SOCIETY, ECONOMICS, GOVERNMENT, or DEMOGRAPHICS.

First prize: $300, a three-year student membership in the World Future Society,  
and free admission to the Society’s 2010 conference in Boston in July.

Second prize: $200, a two-year student membership in the World Future Society,
and free admission to the 2010 conference.

Third prize: $100, a one-year student membership in the World Future Society,
and free admission to the 2010 conference.

General contest rules and essay guidelines

Any questions about these rules and guidelines may be addressed to Society President Tim Mack at tmack@wfs.org.

FOR MORE INFORMATION CONTACT:
World Future Society Headquarters
7910 Woodmont Avenue, Suite 450
Bethesda, Maryland 20814
Web site: www.wfs.org
Telephone: 800-989-8274 or 301-656-8274; fax: 301-951-0394