YOUTH & EDUCATION

Futures literacy, imagination, and belonging for young people and educators
Young people are growing up in times shaped by ecological disruption, social uncertainty, and rapid change. This work supports them - and the educators working with them - to develop futures literacy as a lived, relational capacity grounded in care, belonging, and imagination.

Rather than placing pressure on young people to “solve” complex global challenges, this work helps them make sense of the world they are inheriting and participating in shaping.
Why This Work Matters
Many educational responses to sustainability and futures:
  • overwhelm young people with problems
  • place responsibility for change on individuals
  • prioritise action before reflection
  • measure success through performance or output

This can undermine wellbeing, agency, and meaningful engagement.

This work begins from a different assumption:
young people are sense-makers first. 
What This Work Supports
Across youth and education contexts, this practice supports:
  • a sense of belonging - to self, others, place, and the more‑than‑human world.
  • the ability to imagine futures without fear or pressure to fix everything.
  • agency rooted in care, not urgency.
  • confidence to stay with complexity and uncertainty.
  • ethical and long‑term ways of thinking about change.
  • wellbeing through meaning, connection, and participation.

This is not about preparing young people to become “green entrepreneurs” or climate heroes.

It is about supporting them to become grounded, futures‑oriented citizens and co‑inhabitants with Nature in communities.
Why young people need futures literacy
Futures literacy helps young people learn how futures ideas shape how they think, feel, and act in the present.
Through futures‑led educational practices, young people can:
  • explore how narratives about the future influence their choices today
  • question dominant stories about progress, success, and responsibility
  • imagine multiple possible futures — not just catastrophic or heroic ones
  • develop hope that is realistic, relational, and grounded

​Futures literacy here is relational and reflective — not predictive or strategic.
Who This Work Supports
This work supports:
  • young people across formal and non-formal education settings.
  • schools, colleges, and learning organisations.
  • youth programmes and community initiatives.
  • Environment Educators and facilitators.
  • sustainability and climate education initiatives.
  • organisations working with Education for Sustainable Development (ESD) or Climate Change Education (CCE).

The work adapts to age, context, and culture — while staying grounded in belonging and care.
This work is not about:
  • telling young people what futures they should want
  • pushing action without reflection
  • extracting ideas, outputs, or narratives
  • using youth engagement to legitimise predetermined agendas

​Young people are treated as co-sense-makers.
How This Work Takes Place
Supporting you may include creating and delivering:
  • workshops and learning labs.
  • educator and facilitator training.
  • curriculum co-design.
  • embedded reflective learning spaces.
  • longer-term programme partnerships.

Learning is grounded in experience, dialogue, and reflection.
Futures
Wonder
​Labs®
Futures Wonder Labs® are tailored experiential learning spaces that combine futures literacy, imagination, and reflective practice.
They support young people to:
  • explore questions they genuinely care about.
  • reconnect with curiosity and wonder.
  • practice collective imagination.
  • develop ethical and relational thinking.
  • experience futures as shared and emergent rather than fixed.

​Rather than focusing on outputs, these spaces prioritise relationship, creativity, and lived experience.
Partnering with Innovation Teachers Academy (InTA)
I collaborate with Innovating Teachers Academy (InTA) to deliver futures literacy programmes for educators.

These programmes support teachers and facilitators to integrate futures thinking, imagination, and reflective practice into their work.

New dates are scheduled regularly — please get in touch for upcoming opportunities.
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Futures-Storytelling in Education for Sustainable Development

Embed Climate Change Education: Find Signals and Increase Students' Hope 
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CASE STUDY: INNOVATION CAMP, GENEVA YOUTH CALL
​Supporting the Geneva Youth Call
co-founders and team to launch the 1st World Youth Assembly ​in Geneva in 2022

trusted by...

CASE STUDY: RAISING YOUTH VOICES THROUGH A FUTURES WONDER LAB, CHESHIRE EAST LIBRARIES
Empowering young people to value their imagination, generate innovative ideas with their creativity, and feel activated as local climate change problem-solvers.
"From the very first interaction I had with Elaine, two things were clear: she knew what she was talking about and she had what it takes to help my students raise the game.
Elaine was easily reachable and extremely proactive, which meant that she already had a strong sense of what we were trying to achieve before she had even set the foot in our school.
Sharing the core values of our school as well as deeply connecting with her target audience, Elaine led our students to go beyond what I thought them capable of, embracing and making their own the notions of 'value proposition', 'value chain structure', 'profitability model' as well as 'social, ecological and leadership awareness'.
​Suddenly the UN Sustainable Development Goals were no longer an element you needed to refer to at some point in your presentation but a clear call to action that resonated in all the students' decisions...'
Aurelia Thompson-McNicol, College Alpin Beau Soleil 
Get in touch to talk about your needs
 "I liked this because I was able to express my creativity. It was also very interactive, fun and the same time I learned a lot. It taught me how to create ideas from a starting point which helped me in other subjects. I recommend it to students and young business people because it helps you to create ideas, think more creatively and use visual maps to think more efficiently."
Yr 8 student, St George's International School of Switzerland
You can also become part of the Flourishing Futures Collective community, where we imagine, learn and explore more together. ​