scholarly journals A framework for managing innovation in higher education: lessons learnt from the UAE iPad initiative

2021 ◽  
Vol 17 (1) ◽  
pp. 16-28
Author(s):  
Kenesha Wilson ◽  
Jobila Sy
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Educational Innovation ◽  
Organisational Change ◽  
Gulf Region ◽  
Educational Innovations ◽  
Case Study Methodology ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Empirical Inquiry ◽  
Innovation In Higher Education

Purpose Managing educational innovation in higher education institutions is a complex process that requires specific strategies based on research and proven frameworks. The aim of this paper was to examine how Bolman and Deal’s (2003) theoretical framework can be used to analyse organisational change processes and to evaluate the progress and outcomes of an educational innovation initiative at a university in the Gulf. This educational innovation involved the use of iPads in curricular practices to enhance pedagogical strategies and student learning outcomes. Design/methodology/approach An ethnographic case study methodology was used to make an empirical inquiry that investigated data obtained from direct observations, informal interviews, holistic field notes and documents to better understand a contemporary phenomenon within its real-life context. Findings A critical analysis of this iPad initiative suggested that the main areas of leading and managing this innovation, through Bolman and Deal’s framework, were effectively centred around the human resources, structural and political frames but were less affected by the symbolic frame. Originality/value The authors provide suggestions, based on their experiences as faculty members and academic administrators, on how such innovations can be effectively led and managed. In addition, a new cross-cultural model is proposed for managing future educational innovations in higher education, particularly in the Gulf region. This new model could also be used to effectively evaluate the implementation and management of other educational changes such as those precipitated by the COVID-19 pandemic.

Agile social learning – capacity-building for sustainable development in higher education

2020 ◽  
Vol 21 (7) ◽  
pp. 1563-1586
Author(s):  
Johan Bolmsten ◽  
Momoko Kitada
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Sustainable Development ◽  
Social Learning ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Learning Method ◽  
Case Study Methodology ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Sustainable Solutions ◽  
Life Issues ◽  
The Subject

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to understand the usefulness of an agile social learning method in higher education to build capacity for sustainable development at the community level. Social learning methods intend to empower students (and instructors) to work together in connection with real-life issues – combined with acquiring a conceptual understanding – to analyze issues at hand and work out solutions. The agile format of the method was aimed at a subject that is adaptive and responsive to change to empower the students to take action toward sustainable development. Design/methodology/approach This study was based on a case study methodology where the running of the subject was documented and analyzed for two years. The target student group was maritime professionals who had an interest or were in a position to work with developing sustainable solutions in their home organizations (mostly in developing countries). Findings The results of the analysis indicate how the students learned about environmental, social and economic spheres of sustainable development and their linkages; how the subject format stimulated the students to develop different “learning paths” between the three spheres of sustainable development, which enabled a multi-faceted understanding of sustainable development issues; and, finally, how the students were able to design evolvable sustainable development solutions. Originality/value The results indicate both the novelty and usefulness of the agile social learning method to build capacity for sustainable development through the subject designed for higher education.

Educational innovation: trends for higher education in Brazil

2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Fernanda Edileuza Riccomini ◽  
Claudia Brito Silva Cirani ◽  
Carolina Corrêa de Carvalho ◽  
José Eduardo Storopoli
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Conceptual Model ◽  
Educational Innovation ◽  
University Education ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Innovation Practices ◽  
Innovation Indicators ◽  
Innovation In Higher Education ◽  
Education In Brazil

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to characterize the trends for educational innovation in higher education in Brazil, constructing a conceptual model of innovation trends in the sector. Design/methodology/approach A preliminary profile online was done with 76 experts in university education, and 17 were contacted for in-depth perceptions. The analysis of the content was made of all material and, as a result, the critical analysis of the results, which culminated in the development of a conceptual model and characterization of trends, dimensions and sub-dimensions to innovation in higher education. Findings The dimension universal design of accessibility and learning had major considerations, contributing to implementation of new innovative practices for higher education. Some sub-dimensions emerged, namely governance, risk management, curricular extension and affirmative policies. Research limitations/implications The difficulty in performing the deepening of all dimensions involved in terms of plurality of specialties involved. Practical implications The use of the model and characterization of trends could serve as tools to support the strategic planning of Higher Education Institutions (HEI), and the trends allow planning innovation practices, favoring improvements of HEI, students, employees and community to learning organization. Social implications This paper identifies trends for higher education, highlighting innovation indicators or successful practices, and characterizes the dimensions and sub-dimensions trends; it also makes an undeniable contribution to measure the educational innovation in higher education. Originality/value This paper encourages researchers, in partnership with institutions, to develop scientific projects with other institutions and researchers, to meet interests not only of HEI as a whole, but also of countries that prioritize education with quality, to reach the real educational objectives.

Quality assurance systems: enemies or allies of innovation in higher education institutions?

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Mariana Ferreira de Mello Silva ◽  
Eduardo Raupp de Vargas
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Quality Assurance ◽  
Literature Review ◽  
Higher Education Institutions ◽  
University Management ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Body Of Knowledge ◽  
The University ◽  
The Relationship ◽  
Innovation In Higher Education

Purpose This study aims to examine the extant literature to analyze the relationship between quality assurance (QA) and innovation in the higher education context. Design/methodology/approach This study selected 63 articles through a systematic literature review in Scopus and Web of Science databases and performed a descriptive and thematic synthesis-analysis on the sample. Findings The research identifies several perspectives discussed on QA systems covering experiences, criticisms and practice implications. The literature review shows there is no clear consensus on whether innovation in higher education institutions (HEIs) is fostered or hindered by QA processes. However, it seems that the likelihood of innovativeness and positive QA outcomes are directly linked to how these processes are managed in universities. Research limitations/implications This review highlights the university management concerns that emerge with QA issues as it is not yet clear to what extent innovation is actually promoted in scenarios where QA is applied. Hence, this literature review could be considered comprehensive but not exhaustive. Further studies are recommended to improve the understanding of how HEIs can both innovate and ensure quality at the same time. Originality/value The paper contributes to the existing body of knowledge by advancing the opportunities and challenges that HEIs face due to QA system features.

scholarly journals Professional development of sustainability competences in higher education

2017 ◽  
Vol 18 (5) ◽  
pp. 697-714 ◽  
Author(s):  
Wim Lambrechts ◽  
Elli Verhulst ◽  
Sara Rymenams
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Professional Development ◽  
Change Process ◽  
Organisational Change ◽  
Constructivist Approach ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Political Analysis ◽  
The Individual ◽  
The University

Purpose This paper aims to provide insights into the relation between professional development (PD) and organisational change processes towards sustainability, with a specific focus on empowerment. Design/methodology/approach The paper builds upon a constructivist approach, combining a literature review, a desk research on key publications and reports and a socio-political analysis to reveal the specific context in Flanders, Belgium. Findings are then connected to earlier insights from research on organisational change for sustainability. Findings The paper provides a number of PD initiatives that focus on sustainability in general and in a single higher education (HE) institution. Framing such initiatives as an organisational change process offers insights on how elements of empowerment are currently incorporated in PD initiatives and how it can strengthen them to lead to the further integration of sustainability competences in HE. Research limitations/implications Limitations are linked with the kind of sources used in the constructivist approach. The analysis only looks at written reports on the topic, albeit it also builds upon the first-hand experiences of educators in the HE institution focused upon in the case. Practical implications There is a need to frame PD initiatives as an organisational change process towards sustainability with specific attention towards empowerment. Without this framing, PD approaches comprise the risk of being left in the margins or being understood as single initiatives without any connection to the bigger picture, i.e. the transition towards sustainability in HE. Social implications Interlinking PD and organisational change provides opportunities to frame the sustainability transition within the university in a wider societal context. Originality/value The paper provides an original contribution to the debate on sustainability competences, as it frames the PD within an organisational context, rather than focusing on the individual role of educators.

Higher authority organizational stressors among higher education deans: a multiple case study

2018 ◽  
Vol 10 (3) ◽  
pp. 333-343 ◽  
Author(s):  
Alfred Huan Zhi Chan ◽  
Mohd Dahlan Malek ◽  
Ferlis Bahari
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Multiple Case Study ◽  
Education Institution ◽  
Higher Education Management ◽  
Case Study Methodology ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Organizational Stressors ◽  
Multiple Case ◽  
Education Deans

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to identify higher authority organizational stressors encountered by higher education deans. Design/methodology/approach This current research employed a qualitative approach utilizing a contextual paradigm with a multiple case study methodology. Findings Out of ten investigated deans in a public higher education institution in Malaysia, nine reported experiences of organizational stressor elements arising from higher authority. Three non-overlapping subthemes were systematically discovered. Practical implications Successful identification of these higher authority organizational stressors has implications for higher education management policies. Policies that reduce or eliminate these stressors may create a positive and progressive environment for deans and the higher education field. Originality/value This study will thus serve to promote a deeper understanding of higher authority organizational stressors encountered by higher education deans.

Teaching sustainability-oriented capabilities using active learning approach

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Priscila Borin Claro ◽  
Nathalia Ramajo Esteves
Keyword(s):  
Active Learning ◽  
Business School ◽  
Business Schools ◽  
School Context ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Learning Approach ◽  
Case Study Methodology ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Positive Effects ◽  
The Impact

Purpose This paper aims to discuss how educators can teach sustainability-oriented capabilities (SOCs) using an active learning approach. Design/methodology/approach Using a case study methodology centered on a Brazilian business school, this research combines qualitative analysis of content, such as teacher notes and student work, with quantitative analysis of student grades. The authors used variance analysis and Bonferroni tests to establish whether the means of three test groups were significantly different. The authors also tested for normality, using the Skewness Kurtosis test, and for homoscedasticity, using Levene. Findings The authors’ findings suggest that the active learning (AL) method may be useful in developing SOCs related to the capabilities of “to know,” “to do,” “to interact” and “to be” because it improved student engagement in the program. In addition, this improved engagement was shown to have a positive influence on grades. Research limitations/implications Using convenience sampling, the authors studied a limited number of the mandatory management courses offered by Insper. There is a need to check for nonlinear positive effects over a more extended period of time and considering more courses. Practical implications This paper offers a practical and replicable technique for teaching SOCs in a business school context using AL. Originality/value The existing literature on education and sustainability discusses the role of business schools in the development of SOCs, especially with respect to curricular changes that integrate content and frameworks related to the conceptualization of sustainable development for business (Cebrián and Junyent, 2015; Cortese, 2003; Fairfield, 2018; Aleixo et al., 2020; Leal Filho, 2020; Arruda Filho et al., 2019). However, some studies suggest that the learning process at many business schools fails to explore the complexity of real life by not using a teaching approach that favors the development of SOCs (Leal Filho et al., 2015). Thus, prior studies have pointed to the need for further research on the impact of the active learning approach in teaching about sustainability (Leal Filho et al., 2015; Fisher and Bonn, 2011; Hesselbarth and Schaltegger, 2014). The aim of this research is to contribute to this discussion.

Will interfaces take over the physical workplace in higher education? A pessimistic view of the future

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Dóra Horváth ◽  
Tamás Csordás ◽  
Katalin Ásványi ◽  
Julianna Faludi ◽  
Attila Cosovan ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Real Life ◽  
Physical Space ◽  
Human Interaction ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Group Of Seven ◽  
Working Space ◽  
Online Higher Education ◽  
Physical Setting

Purpose The purpose of this paper is to argue for the sustained need for the physical workplace and real-life encounters in higher education even in the digital age despite being seemingly transformable into the virtual sphere as seen during the COVID-19 situation. Design/methodology/approach This study is based on a collaborative autoethnography by a group of seven higher educators with an overall 2,134 student encounters during the study’s time span. The authors then connect these practitioner observations with relevant COVID-19-related studies thereby adding to research on higher education as a workplace. Findings The data suggest that the physical workplace strongly bolsters the personal experience and effectiveness of higher education through contributing to its dynamics. Spaces predetermine the scope and levels of human interaction of teaching and learning. In a physical setting, all senses serve as mediators, whereas, online, only two senses are involved: vision and hearing. The two-dimensional screen becomes a mediator of communications. In the physical space, actors are free to adjust the working space, whereas the online working space is limited and defined by platforms. Practical implications Although higher education institutions may indeed fully substitute most practices formerly in a physical setting with online solutions, real-time encounters in the physical working space belong to its deeper raisons d'être. Originality/value This paper highlights the necessity of the physical workplace in higher education and describes the depriving potential of the exclusively online higher education teaching setting.

Educating researchers in the metadiscipline of foresight

foresight ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 22 (5/6) ◽  
pp. 703-715
Author(s):  
James P. Kahan
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Best Practices ◽  
Educational Innovations ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Disciplinary Boundaries ◽  
American Higher Education ◽  
The Past ◽  
Scientific Disciplines ◽  
Logical Type ◽  
The Usa

Purpose The science of Foresight differs from the commonplace notion of what a science is because it is a metadiscipline – a logical type of science higher than the logical type of disciplinary sciences. It is practical, uses transdisciplinary processes that combine scientific disciplines and often examines counterfactuals in a scientific manner. This study aims to demonstrate that Foresight is a science, by presenting a number of best practices and potential innovations in higher education that could facilitate obtaining skills for Foresight science. Design/methodology/approach The methods of scientific education that have served us well in the past are inadequate for metadisciplinary sciences such as Foresight. The paper discusses what metadisciplinarity is, using a variety of examples, and distinguishes it from disciplines and ways of crossing disciplinary boundaries. Understanding the essential characteristics of Foresight as a metadisciplinary science leads to identifying current best practices and possible educational innovations in undergraduate education that will facilitate obtaining Foresight skills. Throughout the paper, examples are drawn from the education and professional experience of the author in the USA and Europe. Findings This paper demonstrates that Foresight is a science and presents a number of best practices and potential innovations in higher education that could facilitate obtaining skills for Foresight science. It identifies barriers to those innovations and approaches to overcome them. Originality/value This viewpoint paper clarifies the meaning of the terms interdisciplinarity, transdisciplinarity and metadisciplinarity to identify the essential characteristics of Foresight as a science. Then, it identifies and advocates needed changes in North American higher education to provide earlier and more efficient opportunities for Foresight researchers and users to obtain the skills they need.

scholarly journals Handling disruptive innovations in HE: lessons from two contrasting case studies

2015 ◽  
Vol 23 ◽  
Author(s):  
Stephen Powell ◽  
Bill Olivier ◽  
Li Yuan
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Case Studies ◽  
Business Model ◽  
New Technology ◽  
Organisational Change ◽  
Disruptive Innovation ◽  
Learning Technology ◽  
Educational Innovations ◽  
Online Distance Education ◽  
Online Distance

This article aims to show how Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) can recognise and best respond to a disruptive innovation. A disruptive innovation creates a new business model using a new process and usually a new technology to offer a product or service with new features and/or lower cost and initially addresses a group of people who are either unserved or overserved by existing offerings. By contrast, a sustaining innovation may use the same technology, but enhance an existing business model. To illustrate this, we set out two case studies that each implement the same innovative model of work-focussed learning differently: one in an autonomous sub-unit of an HEI, while the other sought to embed the same model in existing faculty activities in another HEI. The theory of disruptive innovation (Bower and Christensen 1995) is set out and used to understand types of innovation, from sustaining to disruptive, and to identify the model of work-focussed learning as a disruptive innovation. We then used this to analyse the subsequent trajectories and different outcomes of the two case studies. Our aims then were (1) to show how disruptive innovation theory can be used to recognise different types of innovation and (2) to suggest the appropriate way to organisationally structure disruptive educational innovations as semi-autonomous enterprises. We also note potential constraints that government policy may place on HEIs attempting to respond to disruptive innovations.Keywords: disruptive innovation; business model; online distance education; organisational change; higher education(Published: 24 July 2015)Citation: Research in Learning Technology 2015, 23: 22494 - http://dx.doi.org/10.3402/rlt.v23.22494

scholarly journals The COVID-19 pandemic: a catalyst for creativity and collaboration for online learning and work-based higher education systems and processes

2021 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Tashmin Khamis ◽  
Azra Naseem ◽  
Anil Khamis ◽  
Pammla Petrucka
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Developing Countries ◽  
Staff Development ◽  
Online Education ◽  
Teaching And Learning ◽  
Organisational Change ◽  
Faculty Training ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Regulatory Frameworks

PurposeThe purpose of this research is to focus on work-based problems catalysed by the COVID-19 global pandemic, based on a case study of a multi-continental, multi-campus university distributed across Kenya, Tanzania, Uganda and Pakistan. Higher education institutions (HEIs) in developing countries lacked pre-existing infrastructure to support online education and/or policy and regulatory frameworks during the pandemic. The university's programmes in Pakistan and East Africa provide lessons to other developing countries' HEIs. The university's focus on teaching and learning and staff development has had a transformational organisational effect.Design/methodology/approachCase study with participatory approaches aimed at co-production of responsive systems and co-creation of effective curriculum and faculty training is used.FindingsSystems and processes developed across the university in the effort to ensure educational continuity. From the disruption to all educational programmes and the disarray of regulatory bodies' responses, collaboration emerged as a key driver of positive change. The findings reiterate the value of trust and provision of opportunities for those with the requisite competencies to lead in a participatory and distributive manner whilst addressing limited human and financial resources. The findings reflect on previous work respecting organisational change recast in the digital age.Originality/valueThis paper reflects the authors' work in real-time as they led and managed changes encountered during the COVID-19 pandemic. The paper will be of value to management and leadership cadres, particularly in developing contexts, responsible for recovery and sustainability of the higher education sector.

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