Reflecting on 2023

A Year of Collaborative Innovation and Inspiring Partnerships with Fam Studio

As we look to the New Year, we’ve taken a moment to be thankful for the partnerships, relationships and the work delivered together with our inspiring family of collaborators in 2023.

In particular, Fam has had the privilege of working with more than 2,000 children and young people globally, from Kigali to the US, to South London.  They have raised their voice about family, community, emerging technologies and futures thinking and they continue to shape Fam’s work to ensure children and young people and their families can thrive, together with nature, wherever they are.

In 2023, Fam continued to grow, learn and deliver work we are proud of with:

Six new collaborators thinking about the future of learning:
Big Education; Learn More; The New European Bauhaus of the Sea hosted by TBA21; Surrey Square Primary School; Marco Polo Learning

Three new thought leadership organizations: 
House of Beautiful Business; TheirWorld; Capita in partnership with BCG; 

Three new learning communities and innovation labs:
Open Energy Labs; Sesame Workshop Watch Play Learn pilots; Kambe’s Starry Village;

Five new academic partners: 
Prof Rebecca Fiebrink and Melis Meriç, Creative Computing Institute, UAL; Kwame Novixoxo, African Leadership University; Prof. Laura McBain, Stanford d.school; Prof. Penny Hay, House of Imagination University of Bath and Dr. Alex Jordan, Max Plank Institute.

And it has been our pleasure to share the learnings and our work with many of you throughout the year in events where we were invited to speak including Gaudi World Forum; House of Beautiful Business’s The Dream; the United Nations General Assembly; and Leaders on Purpose.

We have been honoured to contribute to and speak in bespoke learning events with: TBA21; World Arts Foundations; Botnar Foundation; The Walt Disney Company UK Consumer product games and publishing 100 strategy day; BrainMind Salon; Post-hoc Salon with John Templeton World Foundation; Nike EMEA strategy retreat.  As well as convening our own Fam Webinar on Futures Thinking with LEGO Foundation, Stanford d.school and Moving Minds Alliance supported by InnovateUK.

We look forward to working with you to deliver a more just, creative and collaborative world in 2024  and we want to thank you for all of the amazing work you are driving.  Looking ahead, we are excited to continue our exploration of participatory tools, Generative AI and unlocking imagination, child safeguarding and child rights by design in an era of GenAI, futures thinking and governance and to delve deeper into a sense of community with partners and to strengthen our commitment to building a thriving and hopeful future for children, young people and families.

Below you will find further detail on some case studies that illustrate the work of children, young people and partners in 2023 that the Fam team wanted to give thanks for.  

Young Futures Co-creation and testing

Surrey Square Primary School is an incredible school in South London that has created a warm, vibrant, and explorative learning environment for all kids to thrive within. Young trailblazers who are students at the school engaged with Fam’s exploration of the role of generative AI in unlocking imagination in the Young Futures Co-creation and testing workshops. We thank Surrey Square Primary School for collaborating with Fam on many projects and enabling their students to be the voices and co-creators of future tools. We also thank workshop collaborators like Rebecca Fiebrink, Creative Computing Institute at the University of Arts and Liz Robinson, Big Education for their fearless exploration of education and emerging technology and dedication to helping kids thrive. Thank you Chilo Graham and Kelly Rowles, Surrey Primary School for your support and for leading such a spectacular school.

Hopeful Energy Futures with Open Energy Labs

We have had the immense pleasure of working closely with Samson Sahmland-Bowling and the talented team at Open Energy Labs and with Kwame Novixoxo, the staff and students at The African Leadership University in Kigali, Rwanda. We are thankful for their support, expertise and collaboration, testing and co-creating with rural communities in Rwanda.

Events:

We were able to explore the edges of many topics that are close to our hearts in events which include:
Awe and the importance of wonder and beauty in design
Intelligence and the many facets of Learning
Blue and Awe as a focus for learning
Imagining the future of education

This year's Fam roundtable was titled Young Futures: Co-visioning tomorrow and our contributing experts were Bo Stjerne Thomsen, LEGO Foundation;  Laura Mcbain, Stanford school and Sweta Shah, Moving Minds Alliance.

Foresight and brands to help kids and families to thrive:

We collaborated with brands that share our vision around the future of kids and families. This year, we had the pleasure of working with Marco Polo Learning to create a visual identity and a cohesive brand narrative. We have worked alongside the Kambe team to develop a new brand identity and a strategy for Starry Village. We were also able to hold a workshop with kids and families at their festival, which helped us gather insights, gain foresight, and co-vision the future of their brand.

In closing, from the bottom of our hearts, we thank each and every one of you. Your insights, support, and collaboration have been the backbone of our journey. We have learned immensely from our interactions, fostering not just professional relationships but also friendships that we cherish deeply.

With Best Wishes for the New Year

Fam Studios