The Way Ahead is designed for students, parents, teachers, administrators and community partners individually or in mixed groups. Teaching and learning topics may include: custom challenges from local scenarios, current events, long term scenarios (20-100 years); current and emerging technologies and jobs; academic and CTE integration models; and the role of culture, arts, design, creativity and entrepreneurship in innovation.

Jim Brazell delivers speeches and group activities to move your audience from why they need to change to how to “DO” educational innovation. For a special event, Jim teams with other speakers such as Dr. David Thornburg (Thornburg Center for Professional Development) and Bob Allen (CEO, Disney I.D.E.A.S.) for a one-two combination program. Formats include speeches, workshops and hands-on computer labs.

The Future is Here: Workforce, Education and Economic Development
In virtually every industry, every city, every school, American communities are asking: If the world is flat, where do we fit in?

Jim Brazell’s “The Future is Here” answers the world is flat with examples of modern technologies which approximate science fiction; emerging and evolving occupations demanding integrated knowledge and skill across professional, high skill and low skill jobs; and community innovation strategies to compete and collaborate in the networked world.

In “The Future is Here,” Jim delivers lessons from the frontlines of US communities, jobs and education. Topics include: (1) Model community and education innovation initiatives, (2) Marketing, messaging and research strategies, and (3) Emerging technologies and jobs. The Future is Here is designed to launch, plan and motivate community initiatives to meet the challenges of living, learning and working in the 21st century.

Science Fiction to Reality
“Science Fiction to Reality” is a fun way to engage students and general audiences in thinking about the future of work, learning and play. Science Fiction to Reality is motivational, informative and humorous. Topics include: emerging science and technology, emerging jobs and the new world of mixed reality.

Jim has delivered “Science Fiction to Reality” to schools and youth programs with one simple reaction: “I have never seen anyone hold my students’ attention like Jim Brazell.” Science Fiction to Reality fits as a keynote address for student technology associations, commencement speeches and career day programs.

Delivered as a speech or workshop, audiences explore the role of arts and culture in technology, the relationship between career and academic planning and the role of science and technology in society. Workshop scenarios may include: solving 21st century challenges such as energy independence, the Missions to Mars and the Moon, or personal career, education and life goals.

Pandora's X-Box: Serious Games, Virtual Worlds & Mixed Reality
While we were not looking, video games leaped out of the box of entertainment into serious domains such as health care and military training. Games are now a medium giving birth to new modes of playing, learning and socializing.

Jim pierces the veil of play to illustrate what is happening in the dynamic world of games, virtual worlds, mixed reality and converging media. From game builders-to game players-to serious games, Jim Brazell delivers insights into trends that are shaping new media and mediated-life in the 21st Century. From emergency response training to language acquisition, video games, virtual worlds and mixed reality are evolving the landscape of human experience.

Green Jobs: Multi-Skill Science, Engineering and Technology Workforce
Green jobs and technologies are of great interest given environmental and economic conditions today. Green Jobs from wind energy, fuel cells, hybrid vehicles, bio-fuels and combined heat and power all have one 21st workplace trend in common--consilience. Consilience is the jumping together of science, engineering and technology resulting in virtually all innovation actors in green technology industries to possess multi- disciplinary knowledge and skills.

Industrial employers more commonly refer to multidisciplinary skills as “multi-craft”, meaning the ability to integrate many traditionally separate specialized work functions into one multi-skilled person. For example, technicians across wind energy, hybrid vehicles and combined heat and power require skilled trades such as electrical and mechanical technicians to integrate new knowledge, skills and abilities (KSA) related to microelectronics and automatic control systems (mechatronics). Fuel cell technicians integrate mechatronics with chemistry and bio-fuels integrates mechatronics with chemistry and biology.

This multi-skilling requirement is functionally similar to the requirement for automotive, manufacturing, heavy equipment and aerospace mechanics to evolve from mechanics associated with "turning a wrench and screwdriver" to technicians and technologists who manufacture, install, operate and maintain microelectronics-based systems in automobiles, manufacturing plants, heavy equipment and aviation-space vehicles. This functional integration of mechanics, electronics and computing is known as "mechatronics".

There is no mechatronics industry sector; rather, it is an enabling approach to technology that is increasingly applied in a number of economic sectors including: Biotechnology, Life Science & Medical; Electronics & Applied Computer Equipment; Telecommunications & Information Services; Distribution, Transportation & Logistics; Heavy & Special Trade Construction; Energy, Mining & Related Support Services; Petroleum Refining & Chemical; Transportation Equipment; Production Support & Industrial Machinery; Agriculture, Forestry & Food; Aerospace, Homeland Security and Defense.

TEAMS: Connecting the Dots across CTE, STEM and the Arts
Today much focus is given to the integration of Career and Technical Education (CTE) and academic courses. The acronym STEM itself represents the relational grouping of science and math from academics and technology and engineering from CTE. As the STEM and CTE-Academic integration movements grow, national stakeholders concerned about US capacity for innovation are asking questions about the relationship among CTE, STEM, and the Arts.

The arts, STEM and CTE are naturally connected by the intersection of the Internet and traditional mass media, publishing and cultural arts industries. The intersection of these industries results in a process known as “media convergence.” Media convergence is the force driving digital media into new roles in traditional mass media, publishing and cultural arts industries: Recently, “the downfall of newspapers.” In this world, “content” is said to be “king.”

Digital content includes text, audio, video, images, software, simulations and multi-media delivered real-time or on-demand via telecommunications networks and digital devices. The integration of digital content and traditional media results in the evolution of related industries, technologies, jobs and markets. Today, the combination of the Information Technology (IT) and the Arts, A/V Technology and Communications (Arts) clusters jointly satisfy the technical labor requirements of these industries. The worlds of IT and the arts are now inextricably linked by modern STEM providing an opportunty for the marriage of classical art theory and insruction to technology-based CTE programs. For example: music, drawing, painting, photography and videography now all have STEM-related digital production processes and tools driving new products, work processes and environments for innovation.