“The Rise of the Phoenix”: Empowering Learners to Create Their Own Learning Cultures and Transform Their School

An account of a persistently failing New York City high school’s rapid transformation. Urban Assembly School for Green Careers had a 39% graduation rate in 2013 and ranked in the bottom 1% of high schools citywide. As a transformation strategy, the school employed an innovative educational design known as Learning Cultures, which distributes responsibility for learning to learners. After the first year of implementation the graduation rate rose by 11%. After two years of implementation the school received a “well developed” rating on its external quality review. After 4 years the graduation rate doubled. This report describes the school design and provides an account of educational outcomes.

Individualizing Workplace Learning with Digital Technologies

Vocational education and training (VET) at Swiss enterprises includes the work with various digital technologies. They ease administration of work hours, work tasks, evaluations or log book remarks; they support communication with peers, co-workers and trainers; and they come in handy for idea development and creative work. Overarching trends in terms of changing learning cultures in apprenticeship training, such as individualization, flexibilization, self-organized learning, project work or coaching, support the introduction of these technologies and also benefit from them. Based on three in-depth case studies, results on the usage and impact of digital technologies will be presented. This chapter addresses the following research questions: Which digital tools are used in workplace training? What are potential benefits and extended justifications for the use of digital tools? How are modern learning cultures impacting the use of digital tools? We will outline how and where digital technologies are used at the workplace in apprenticeship training, why management has introduced them and how apprentices and their trainers benefit from it. Based on our findings, we will draw conclusions about how learning cultures are influencing the use of technologies and vice versa how the introduction of these technologies shapes innovative learning cultures in VET.

Cultivating a learning culture in the US Navy

Purpose This paper aims to explore the cultivation of a learning culture in the US Navy (USN). The intent of preparing and sharing this research is to reveal the particular challenges of developing learning organization capability in national security organizations. This paper believes this effort will contribute to the evolution and establishment of learning organization models that are replicable across and adaptable to distinct industrial settings. Design/methodology/approach Several efforts were explored and assessed by applying relevant research in the learning organization literature to trends in current organizational practice within the USN. Findings Recent USN learning culture efforts align with the broader, multi-sector, global trend toward building learning organizations to develop people as a source of competitive advantage. This research reveals the trials of enabling learning organizations across large, hierarchical bureaucracies with substantial structural and cultural barriers. The myriad obstacles currently being addressed by the USN, both at an institutional level and at smaller organization and unit levels, can inform the development of learning cultures. In particular, this research highlights the need to align specific efforts to the appropriate level of the organization. Originality/value This paper contributes to the learning organization conversation by examining the associated challenges through a multi-level framework – top, middle and bottom.

Love your mistakes!—they help you adapt to change. How do knowledge, collaboration and learning cultures foster organizational intelligence?

PurposeThe study aims to determine how the acceptance of mistakes is related to adaptability to change in a broad organizational context. Therefore, it explores how knowledge, collaboration and learning cultures (including “acceptance of mistakes”) might help organizations overcome their resistance to change.Design/methodology/approachThe study used two sample groups: students aged 18–24 years (330 cases) and employees aged >24 years (326 cases), who worked in knowledge-driven organizations. Structural equation models were developed, assessed and compared.FindingsThe effect of the “learning climate” on “adaptability to change” mediated by “acceptance of mistakes” has been detected for young students aged 18–24 years; however, this relationship is not significant for business employees aged >24 years. This result indicates that organizations, unlike universities, do not use mistakes as a tool to support learning that is to lead to change.Research limitations/implicationsBoth samples used in the study were obtained from Poland. The business sample was in the majority represented by small and medium-sized enterprises. Therefore, the presented findings may only be applicable to Poland.Practical implicationsAcceptance of mistakes is vital for developing a learning culture. Mistakes help employees adapt to change. Hence, a learning culture that excludes the acceptance of mistakes is somehow artificial and may be unproductive. Paradoxically, the findings reveal that the fact that employees’ intelligence (adaptability to change) improves via mistakes does not mean that organizational intelligence will also increase. Thus, organizations that do not develop mechanisms of learning from mistakes lose the learning potential of their employees.Originality/valueThis study proposes a constant learning culture scale that includes the “acceptance of mistakes” and “learning climate” dimensions. Further, it empirically proves the value of mistakes for adaptability to change. Moreover, it also contributes to the existing literature by demonstrating the mechanism of the relationship between knowledge, collaboration and learning cultures in the context of adaptability to change. This study breaks with the convention of “exaggerated excellence” and promotes the acceptance of mistakes in organizations to develop organizational intelligence.

Understanding Students’ Resistance to Autonomous Learning in an L2 English Language Course at a University in Lebanon

This qualitative research investigates students’ resistance to autonomous learning activities in an English language course at a university in Lebanon. Data was gathered across four sections of English 101 based on observations of 68 students, focus group discussions and two teachers’ reflective diaries. Thematic analysis yielded that students showed signs of resistance during collaborative learning, metacognitive activities, and the evaluation process. The students were also unwilling to independently use available language learning resources. The data suggested that the possible causes of resistance lay in the mismatches between students’ expectations and the course design, the learning cultures that the students bring to the classroom, and students’ perceptions of the place English holds both at the university and in their lives. This study reveals that expressions of resistance during classroom interactions resonate with the complex and layered nature of English language learning.

From Learning Organizations to Learning Cultures and More: Evolutions in Theory, Changes in Practice, Continuity of Purpose

This chapter examines the evolution of concepts pertaining to the criticality of learning in the pursuit of organizational transformation and effectiveness. Over time, the popularity of the learning organization, learning portfolios, learning cultures, and organizational reliability has waned. Some scholars have considered these concepts within a descriptive perspective, others in a prescriptive manner. This chapter does not advocate for one perspective or paradigm over another but promotes awareness of their distinctions and how they offer different frames for comparing “organizational learning” versus the “learning organization” and “learning culture.” While scholars and practitioners are all concerned with organizational effectiveness, they point towards it in unique ways using conceptual labels that can be interpreted in diverse fashions. That often contributes to intellectual churn and further evolutions in conceptual development and popularity. Implications for the morality of learning processes and their benefit to society are considered.