Professor Rob Dunn, NC State Senior Vice Provost for Interdisciplinary Programs, in collaboration with Greg Raschke, Director of NC State Libraries, leads The Long View, Conversations on the Future being implemented through FY 2024-25 to help guide future planning for NC State’s diverse portfolio of interdisciplinary centers. This effort highlights a series of scenarios for the future through conversations between individuals with disciplinary depth, innovators in technologies relevant to a particular topic, broad-thinking generalists, and experts with an understanding of historical or social context. Professor Dunn and his colleagues are conducting and cataloging in-person conversations with leading researchers about the intermediate and far future contextualized considering stasis and business-as-usual models of the future.
To date, several conversations have been held with leading researchers on the following topics:
- Disruptive Science, with Russell Funk, Associate Professor of Strategic Management and Entrepreneurship, Carlson School of Management, University of Minnesota;
- AI in Higher Education, with James Lester, Director of the NSF AI Institute for Engaged Learning and NC State Distinguished Professor of Computer Science;
- Demographic Change and U.S. Enrollment Trends, with Patrick Lane, Vice President of the Western Interstate Commission for Higher Education’s Policy Analysis and Research unit;
- Academic Big Data, with Daniel Larremore, Assistant Professor of Computer Science, University of Colorado, Boulder;
- Massive Online Classes, with Pia Sorensen, Senior Preceptor in Chemical Engineering and Applied Materials, John A. Paulson School of Engineering and Applied Sciences, Harvard University.
In FY 2023-24, the Long View Initiative engaged freelance science journalist JoAnna Klein to conduct Long View Interviews and communicate insights to various audiences, both within the university and to the general public. The Long View Podcasts project is under development. This effort invites NC State graduate students to submit a pitch for a podcast (that they would produce) that would anticipate and explore the future of some aspect of science or technology. A total of 23 proposals were submitted. They were individually evaluated by Long View team members, and nine podcasts were selected. Some of the topics of the selected podcasts include the future of smart textiles; urine diversion (also known as “peecycling”) as a novel approach to source phosphorus for fertilizer; and ethical issues associated with AI and “self-driving labs.” To date, four of the nine podcasts have been completed and submitted.
A public event focusing on Envisioning Urban Futures was held at the Hunt Library on October 18, 2023, and had a full audience of over 240 attendees. The event featured a series of short, TED-style talks, future-focused food and drink, demonstrations, poster presentations, music, and artistic interpretations of envisioned urban futures. This event was a partnership between the Office of University Interdisciplinary Programs, the College of Design’s Initiative for Community Growth and Development, the NC State University Libraries, Arts NC State, and the NC State Arts Village. The Fall 2024 Envisioning Urban Futures: Charlanta event will be exploring the anticipated future southeastern megalopolis of Charlanta (so named because it will stretch from Charlotte to Atlanta, and beyond) and what current research can do to make Charlanta healthier, safer, greener, more livable and more just.
This event is scheduled on Wednesday, Nov. 13 from 5:30-9:00 p.m. in the Hunt Library at NC State. Professor Dunn reported that 32 faculty members, 6 undergraduates, 35 graduate students, three K-12 teachers, and 13 K-12 students have been engaged in Long View activities and events in FY 2023-24. KIETS support leverages cash and in-kind commitments from the NC State Libraries, SE Climate Adaptation Science Center, Comparative Medicine Institute, TriCEM, Sigma Xi, NC Museum of Natural Sciences, Danish Natural History Museum, and the College of Agriculture and Life Sciences.
The Long View project has developed a website to broadly share information about the possible futures uncovered through the project’s conversations, interviews, and events.