Learning Resources

Abstract: This article lays the groundwork for “the connected university” as the most desirable, most robust operational platform for both achieving institutionally coherent integrated planning and delivering on the mandate to grow, challenge, and inspire creative young minds. Beginning with Bateson’s prescription that we “learn to think as Nature thinks” and appreciating not only the connectivity and related mental processes embedded in large-scale natural systems but also the inherent connectivity and associated mental processes underlying our disparate branches of knowledge, the author argues for a more experimental and deliberate approach to manifesting this connectivity and the corresponding critically important mental processes across the structures, departments, pedagogical forms, and policies of our universities. Our universities too, he says, need to learn to think as Nature thinks. He points to the “connectivity imperative” voiced over the years by thought leaders in multiple fields, including Thomas Homer-Dixon, Franz Johansson, Albert Einstein, Vartan Gregorian, and Buckminster Fuller while at the same time acknowledging the obstacles to connectivity so deeply embedded in our university cultures, practices, politics, and reward systems. Turning to his own story, the author recounts how as a youngster, prompted by a unique gift of Chopin’s music and Einstein’s writings, he first began to think about the exciting hidden connections to be discovered by combining and savoring experiences from different disciplines. He underscores the tricky interplay of belief and perception as we endeavor to figure out how the world works—how what we believe informs perception and how new perceptions, mediated by learning and experience, can inform what we believe—charging our educational systems, and higher education in particular, with the responsibility of helping students form their world-defining “inner Eye,” that “eye” through which they perceive the world around them and conceive their worlds of the future. He concludes with a list of prototypes and “winning solutions” that have enhanced connectivity within several universities with which he has had personal involvement. His vision for the transformation of universities is ultimately pragmatic as well as idealistic, moving institutions toward greater connectivity through the proliferation of modestly scaled “pocket” connectivity programs as well as university-wide integrated planning initiatives where larger scale and more radical visions might be debated and strategized with unfettered imagination and a sense of urgency.

Abstract: Higher education institutions are under pressure to make transformative changes aimed at improving key areas of performance: access, affordability, price, and productivity to name a few. Institutions have responded with budget cuts and efficiency gains with incremental success. Yet paradoxically the very success they have achieved has also impeded the transformative change their stakeholders seek.

Many theories exist to support adaptive change in higher education. A single foundational theory of organizational change in industrial enterprises explains the paradox and illustrates how incremental success slows transformative change. Structural contingency theory, introduced by Alfred Chandler in 1962, encapsulates a number of higher education change theories, further grounding practitioners as they assist institutions in adapting to changing conditions and informing their planning efforts.

To achieve transformative change requires a model of integrated planning to synthesize unit improvements into institutional change greater than the sum of its parts. This article presents structural contingency theory to explicate the change process and introduces institutional portfolio management as an operational model of integrated planning. It speaks to an audience of practitioners seeking pragmatic solutions to very real and present problems.

Abstract: Integrated planning is a key concept for higher education planners. But it is difficult to define and even harder to express through individual competencies. Questions remain: what are the key constructs of integrated planning, what skill sets compose integrated planning, and how can it be measured? We suggest that integrated planning cannot be fully examined at the level of the individual planner, but rather that integrated planning is an institutional manifestation—understood only through organizational observation. This article explores this concept and makes a case for integrated planning as an organizational competency. We explain why orienting from this perspective is critical to success.

Abstract: “Integrated strategic planning” is a much more collaborative process in its development and execution than the practice of the executive team and/or a consultant simply drafting a plan with the expectation that it will be implemented by others. In this article, the author recounts her unique experience in going through the strategic planning process twice in the same stressful environment of an educational institution beset by financial, cultural, and accreditation challenges. The first plan was unsuccessful because it did little to engage institutional stakeholders as the board and administration did what they separately believed was best. It was drafted by the author in her capacity as an outside consultant and according to the instructions of the then executive team. On the second occasion, the prior president had been replaced by the author. As the new leader of the institution, the author used an integrated planning process. The result was a more meaningful plan as the stakeholders worked together and held each other accountable in its development and execution, leading to a turnaround that saved the school and surprised the community.

Abstract: This report was produced by the researcher awarded the M. Perry Chapman Prize for 2014–2015.

While face-to-face collaboration has been theorized to be a key element in intellectual development and cognition, no formal method of quantitative measurement has been applied to understand collective face-to-face learning in academic institutions or how patterns of interaction and individual reflection may reveal information exchange among students within educational institutions. To address this gap, this study introduces a novel tool and framework to promote the systematic study of peer collaboration for general use in education.

Results of this applied research will be useful to architects, interior designers, librarians, educators, and researchers interested in obtaining empirical evidence and applying it to the design of learning environments and the assessment of how well spaces intentionally relate to learning. This research project introduces a common means for researchers in space design, education, and information science to develop principles and best practices to improve return on investment in the design of informal learning environments.

Abstract: Recently, education researchers have emphasized the redesign of learning spaces to better accommodate pedagogical change. In particular, studies have found evidence of the relationship between the built environment and learning outcomes—however, no current studies have deliberately focused on the “minority majority” feature of America’s future student composition.

This pilot study was conducted to evaluate how space contributes to the learning outcomes of a demographically diverse class of students at Morgan State University, a Historically Black Institution. Based on the neurobiological literature on environmental enrichment, the authors hypothesized that an enriched learning environment will correlate with increased student activity (directed movement) and engagement (with other students, with room features) and result in significantly improved learning outcomes for an ethnically diverse student group.