“A Hopeful Education for the End of the World as We Know It”? A Conversation with Ginie Servant-Miklos, Raïsa Mirza, Will Richardson & Manda Scott

The inspiration for this end-of-year impromptu gathering came
from a recent flurry of ‘Collapse'-inspired exchanges in my
(un)social media feeds! This was prompted largely by Ginie
Servant Miklos’ recently published and brilliant book, Pedagogies
of Collapse: A Hopeful Education for The End of The World as We
Know It (quoted in the title of the episode) and Will
Richardson’s equally provocative and inspiring, Confronting
Education In a Time of Complexity, Chaos and Collapse.


As regular listeners will know, this podcast is really focused on
the need for radical and systemic change in ways that would be
more loving, humanising, nourishing…, not just in education, but
in all spheres of our lives. But seeing all of this Collapse
chat, the question I was left with was something about the ‘how’
of inviting people towards this change. It made me think of this
powerful quote from Adam Curtis:


"We’ve retreated into a sense that there’s always a new
apocalypse on the horizon; it’s a terrible teddy bear that the
bourgeois greens hug to themselves and say, “We’re all going to
die, it’s terrible.” That’s not the way you change the world. In
fact, it frightens people, and when people are frightened they
don’t want change. It’s one of the stupidest things I’ve ever
seen. Of course, there are serious issues. And of course, they’re
incredibly dangerous. But fear is the last resort of those who’ve
failed to mobilise people to transform the world for the better.
I get grumpy about this because it’s almost cowardly.”
(https://crackmagazine.net/article/profiles/adam-curtis-nathalie-olah-interview/)


So Manda Scott, Raïsa Mirza, Will Richardson, Ginie
Servant-Miklos and I gathered yesterday to talk about all of this
and more!


Brief bios below, but you can find full show notes here:
https://www.goodimpactlabs.com/podcast/a-hopeful-education


Manda Scott - https://mandascott.co.uk/ ;
https://www.linkedin.com/in/mandascottauthor/ 


Manda was once a veterinary surgeon and is now an award-winning
novelist, smallholder, contemporary shamanic trainer and
podcaster (https://accidentalgods.life). 2024 saw the publication
of her sixteenth novel, Any Human Power, a ‘visionary’
contemporary political thriller that maps fictional – but
plausible and workable – routes toward a future we’d all be proud
to leave to the generations that come after us: human and
more-than-human.


Raïsa Mirza - https://raisamirza.com/ ;
https://www.linkedin.com/in/raisamirza/ 


Raïsa is a Bangladeshi-Canadian photographer, educator, designer,
facilitator and social entrepreneur. She is currently Head of
Social Impact Initiatives & Lighthouse Changemaker Hub and
Systems Transformation teacher
(https://www.uwcatlantic.org/learning/academic/systems-transformation-pathway)
at UWC Atlantic College, Wales. She is also Founder &
Principal of WabiSabiJetty: Design for Resilience
(https://www.wabisabijetty.com/). 


Will Richardson - https://willrichardson.com/ ;
https://www.linkedin.com/in/willrichardsonbqi/ 


Will is a co-founder of The Big Questions
Institute which was created to help educators use "fearless
inquiry" to make sense of this complex moment and an uncertain
future. In 2024, he authored a "manifesto" titled "Confronting
Education in a Time of Complexity, Chaos, and Collapse" aimed at
provoking serious conversations about the future of
schools. 


Ginie Servant-Miklos - 
https://www.clubofrome.org/member/miklos-ginie/;
https://www.linkedin.com/in/ginie-servant-miklos/ 


Ginie Servant-Miklos is Assistant Professorship in Behavioural
Sciences at the Erasmus School of Social and Behavioural Sciences
in Rotterdam and founder and Chair of the Board of
the ⁠⁠FairFight Foundation. She co-founded the Bildung
Climate School with Prof. Rutger Engels, and is the author of the
best-selling book, Pedagogies of Collapse: A Hopeful Education
for the End of the World as We Know It
(https://www.bloomsburycollections.com/monograph?docid=b-9781350400528).