Future Fest 2024: The Educators’ Edition.

Future Anything hosted its’ first event large scale, one-day professional learning conference for educators on Wednesday 14 February 2024 in Brisbane.

Over 100 teachers and leaders from schools across Australia took part in Future Fest: The Educator’s Edition, held at QUT’s Kelvin Grove Campus thanks to the team at QUT Entrepreneurship.

Future Anything welcomed Jan Owen AM, Co-Chair of Learning Creates Australia as the keynote speaker for the day. Jan unpacked recent Learning Creates research that highlights how few young people are using ATAR to step into the post-secondary school pathways, and delivered a powerful call to action for all educators to consider how we empower our students to become ‘more than’ their ATAR results.

The day also featured a range of hands-on workshops led by Future Anything’s experienced educators covering diverse topics including ‘Building Capabilities in your Classroom”, “Levelling up your Curriculum for V9.0” and “Transforming Assessment into a Celebration”.

A cohort of Future Anything’s Activators including Murray Galbraith  (Syntropic Studio), Hayley Langsdorf (Thoughts Drawn Out) and Adele Laughton (Queensland Social Enterprise Council) took part in a discussion exploring how educators can unleash entrepreneurship in the classroom by empowering schools to connect to, and leverage the brilliance of, key thinkers and doers in their local communities.

QUT Entrepreneurship’s Associate Professor James Davies brought a fascinating academic perspective to the day diving into a tool for assessing entrepreneurial alertness in school contexts. 

One word to describe Future Fest 2024 

In the online feedback survey at the end of the day, 100% of participants said they would recommend Future Fest to others schools and educators. When asked for one word to describe the day, the top responses included ‘Incredible”, “Informative”, “Relevant” and “Engaging”.

All respondents also agreed that they picked up some useful tools they will use in future.

Reflecting on the day,  Vanessa Bermingham from St Laurence’s College said “I was so inspired by the day. I cannot wait to go back to my school and try things. It’s going to be awesome.”

Rockhampton State High School’s Dominic Maguire commented “Future Fest was an engaging day of PD that challenges conventions and encourages you to think about what education could be, rather than what it has been. The future is coming fast and today has helped me become a teacher that is preparing my students for it.”

Many attendees commented on the practical and applicable nature of the learning on the day, with Richard Dorian from Caloundra City Private School commenting “[Future Fest was] one of the best, most practical professional development sessions I have attended.” 

Yarrabilba State Secondary College’s Andrew Gilbert added “This PD feels like something to actually use and stick to. Not like others PDs that sounds like it is some government buzzwords being packaged to you”. Valerie Beattie, a teacher at Glasshouse Cristian College said “Best PD ever. So relevant and hands on tools to use.”

Future Anything delivers a range of inspiring and most of all, practical professional development workshops for teachers at all levels in schools across Australia.

Check out our portfolio here or get in touch to chat about brining a program to you school!