5th generation universities form alliances that look to the future and seek to have an impact both nationally and globally to bring about positive change. Leaders of 5th generation universities must have foresight.

In the early 1870s, a group of Methodists were holding a convention on the campus of Hartsville College, Indiana. The College President started the conference by sharing his vision for society: “We live in an exciting age, the age of inventions.” He explained to the ministers present how he thought that people would one day fly from place to place instead of riding horses. However, a man named Bishop Milton Wright stood up in protest: “Heresy! The Bible says that flight is reserved for the angels! We will have no such talk at this conference.” He continued to say that if God had intended man to fly, He would have given him wings. The Bishop collected his two young sons, Orville and Wilbur, and left.

About 30 years later, on 17 December 1903, the Wright brothers made the first powered flight, something their father once thought was impossible to achieve. As university leaders in a new era of existential threats facing humanity and our planet, will we be prepared to take risks to bring about positive change for the benefit of all our futures? Or will we prefer to remain in our comfort zones, in Museums of Procrastination, tied to old ways and traditions of how universities should work?

Intriguingly, Bishop Wright bought a cork toy for his boys when they were seven and eleven years old that resembled a helicopter, with a propeller driven by a rubber band. The toy had sparked the boys’ imagination and a lifelong interest in flight. The boys became bicycle mechanics and, despite many failures in their experiments with gliders, on 17 December, Orville made history, flying 120 feet in 12 seconds, and then later in the day, Wilbur flew for 59 seconds.