Africans are investing in higher education, but the lack of job opportunities for graduates is helping to drive a brain drain, argued University of California, Davis, economist Philip Martin in a recent online discussion hosted by the Population Reference Bureau. Martin is the author of the new PRB report, “Remittances and the Recession’s Effects on International Migration.”
In his PRB Discuss Online appearance on May 26, Martin pointed out that a lack of opportunities for university graduates with advanced degrees in their home countries gives them little choice but to seek employment elsewhere.
“Many African countries spend relatively more on higher education than on K-12 schooling, which leads to ‘too many’ university graduates who cannot find jobs, prompting them to emigrate,” he said. Martin projects that international migration of both educated and non-educated African workers will continue to increase.
The remittances that these workers send back to family members and loved ones provide a bit of a boost to their home countries’ overall economies, Martin observes in his report. These remittances can help create jobs and fund startup costs for small businesses in the migrant workers’ home countries. However, “sending workers abroad and receiving remittances cannot alone generate development,” Martin warns.
Although these monetary gifts may not counterbalance the loss of skilled (as well as so-called “unskilled”) workers, they make a significant impact. During the online discussion, Martin cited World Bank statistics: In 2010, remittances sent by workers from developing countries back home totaled around $325 billion. Projections for 2011 are even higher, and, according to the World Bank, that figure should increase by $50 billion in 2012. This is triple the amount of international aid money received.
There are other benefits and drawbacks to the brain drain, as well. “Migration can set in motion virtuous circles, as when sending Indian IT workers abroad leads to new industries and jobs in India, or set in motion vicious circles, as when the exit of professionals from Africa leads to less health care and too few managers to operate factories,” Martin explained during the Q&A session.
Martin recommends that policy makers in countries to which workers are migrating create legislation that protects them rather than trying to limit migration or restrict migrants’ rights.
Source: Population Reference Bureau, www.prb.org.
A daylong workshop on futures thinking, forecasting methods, and strategic planning was offered to museum professionals attending the American Association of Museums’ annual meeting and expo in Houston in May 2011.
“Forecasting the Future of Museums: A How-to Workshop” was organized by the association’s Center for the Future of Museums (CFM). The workshop tied in nicely with the overall theme of the conference, “The Museum of Tomorrow.” Both the forecasting workshop and the general conference focused on ways that museums can evolve and adapt to the various shifts—political, economic, environmental, technological, and cultural—now taking place.
The workshop was led by CFM founding director Elizabeth Merritt; Peter Bishop, director of the Future Studies program at the University of Houston; and Garry Golden, lead futurist at the management consultancy futurethink. The workshop covered both the principles of foresight and museum futures specifically.
“We reviewed the basics of futures studies in the morning, explaining how trends and events can disrupt our path to the ‘expected’ future,” Merritt explains. The leaders also conducted an exercise: “Participants created cards for a forecasting deck in the course of these exercises, which we then used in the afternoon as they learned how to create scenarios to explore potential futures.”
Most of the afternoon was devoted to creating and exploring scenarios. Several wild cards were considered, including the possibility that museums could lose federal tax-exempt status and the occurrence of an event such as a pandemic or terrorist act that “might radically restrict travel or people’s willingness to congregate in public places,” Merritt says.
The workshop closed by looking at ways that museum directors can incorporate forecasting methods such as trend analysis, visioning, and scenario building into their strategic planning. According to the CFM, strategic long-term planning is essential for museum professionals, but short-term planning is currently more prevalent.
Those who couldn’t be at the conference in person had the opportunity to “attend” a virtual component taking place simultaneously. During the CFM’s online presentation, “Practical Futurism: Harnessing the Power of Forecasting for Your Institutional Planning,” several museum directors addressed the need to identify what Merritt describes as “the trends that challenge their local communities … and their museums’ own sustainability”—and to respond to them accordingly.
“The two other activities CFM specifically orchestrated were an ‘Ask a Futurist’ booth, staffed by faculty and students from the University of Houston, and an installation on the future of natural history museums by artist Tracy Hicks,” says Merritt. The art installation, titled Helix: Scaffolding #21211, also explored natural history museums’ projected influence on the Earth’s ecology.
Such events provide clear indication that museums—sometimes considered mere repositories of history—are orienting toward the future as well.
Sources: American Association of Museums, www.aam-us.org.
Center for the Future of Museums, www.futureofmuseums.org.
From smart growth to traffic control measures, citizens of the Township of Delta in Michigan recently had the opportunity to voice their preferences on issues affecting their future.
In May 2011, the township’s community development department held a futuring session to gather information on issues surrounding the township’s growth and development. The meeting was part of an effort to review and update the township’s parks and recreation plan, non-motorized transportation plan, and comprehensive land use and infrastructure plan. Around 70 participants offered input to help community developers set objectives and goals for the future.
According to planning director Mark Graham, “participants were asked numerous questions pertaining to the future of the township in relation to urban sprawl, public transit, environmental protection, placemaking, recreational amenities, and the provision of public services.”
Those in attendance voted anonymously, via hand-held electronic devices, on 21 multiple-choice questions such as, “Which one of the following environmental issues do you feel will present the biggest challenge to the quality of life for township residents in the future?”
Afterwards, the results of the poll were tallied. Citizens participating in the exercise clearly saw “loss of open space” as a detriment to Delta Township’s future, followed by “high fuel prices [that] make suburban commuting less desirable.”
“The survey results from the futuring session will be one of the data sources used in compiling goals and policies for the updating of the township’s comprehensive plan,” Graham says.
An online version of the survey augmented the futuring session’s results and enabled those who could not attend to have a voice. The next step will be to schedule a public hearing to gain crowd feedback on a proposed draft of future plans.
Source: Delta Township Community Development Department, www.deltami.gov.