Kimberley Roelvink
On the 12th of January 2016, the secondary school “de Hogeberg”, was open for visitors. This evening the students form 5 Havo and 6 VWO were presenting their “Profielwerkstuk”. Many students, brothers and sisters, fathers, mothers, grandpas, grandmas and teachers where gathered. We asked different persons who were coming in and out of the school if they had time to think with us how Texel would look like in 50 years, to have the courage and dear to dream into a since-fiction movie about Texel 2065.
We received a lot of different answers, many people were scared to think so far ahead into the future. We asked them which values they want to preserve and what had to be changed. We tried to get them into a story mode to describe how a day in 2065 would look like and why they chose that options.
Some students told us, they wanted to leave Texel and see the world, even is all education from the world was reachable in your own house. They wanted to see the world and discover how they should survive on their own and become more independent.However, they were open to online learning if it becomes ‘trendy’. They could see themselves learning on the internet with video’s, skype, facebook, Instagram etc: that would save them time in transportation. Some said no direct human interaction is needed, the internet will connect them all, others find is still important. When we ask, would you go to school, or to a cafe or house and meet a local who can explain your subject they found it a lovely idea. We also ask if it was possible that learning would go buy a chip, but that's not done. Maby some device which you could place on your head or glasses with direct internet access was possible. But then, real education would become superfluids. If they had to opportunity to follow courses from all over the world, they still would choose something which has a job opportunities on the island. They found it very important to create a whole year long economy, so tourist would visit the island whole year long, so they could focus more on learning and doing one single thing.
The teachers we spoke with though the school wouldn't change. The school is still very important and students will come there every day. The Internet would be very important to reach information, doing exercises, making exams, but real life connection support is unthinkable for them.
We also talked with an older lady, she was already 80 years so see really understood our dream vision. Changes are done very fast. According to her, the technical life is to far reach. Texel will be a low-tex basic island, independent and not connected with the Netherlands. People would live on primary basic needs and even naked because it was a warm tropical climate.
When we addressed the topic about youngsters not coming back to the island, there were very different answers. Some students foresaw a doom for Texel: in 2065, Texel will not exist! Either because there are not more people or because the sea level rises. Another girl said that there will be only old people and no kids.No youngster likes Texel anymore, only old people. However, other people both students and parents thought that the island will never be empty because people want to come back to make a living in Texel when they are older, that Texel getting empty is not a problem at all.
One young (16 years old) guy, who was studying already bioinformatics outside Texel, said that there were three reasons why he did not want to come back to Texel: no fun activities, high rental of the housing and no good job opportunities. We asked him what did he use to do in Texel for leisure and he said ‘not much’. Sometimes they went to the beach, but this was not special anymore. He liked to surf and Texel’s beach did not have enough waves! His friend said that for leisure she went to the cinema, to have a drink on Friday evening...but that there were not many young people to do that with.
We talked to a woman who was not from Texel and her reaction to our question about youngsters leaving the island was: the problem is the other way around. Texelaars should leave the island more! But they are scared to go out, they want to feel safe on Texel and
they are really closed (high local identity) people. Joking, she said that Texelaars only talked to her when they were drunk, as she was not from the island. Youngsters who come back and they get jobs of the lower level than their studies level, for example in the area of tourism and this should change. When saying that then the island will be empty, she was more concerned...and we arrived at the conclusion that the real problem is that more jobs of higher level need to be created on the island.
