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Enhancing Experiential Learning Opportunities Through the Integration of Continuous Improvement Practices
Get PDFExperiential learning (EL) in higher education has become a prominent academic curriculum component. Recent provincial guidelines emphasize that post-secondary institutions provide students EL opportunities, outlining criteria as to what counts as an EL activity. While these guidelines provide instruction on what an EL opportunity should contain, it does not detail how post-secondary institutions should develop and implement these activities responsive to their unique student population needs. This Organizational Improvement Plan (OIP) aims to determine how an Ontario university can provide meaningful, student-focused EL opportunities through a centralized, theoretically-informed EL implementation framework. It centers around a Problem of Practice (PoP) at Gordon University (GU), where the absence of formal internal practices on how to develop and implement EL has created an imbalance in current offerings. Throughout the OIP, a distributed-adaptive hybrid leadership approach combined with the change path model (Cawsey et al., 2016) creates a pathway to propel identified change practices forward. An organizational analysis identifies key change areas, determining the scope and type of change needed. Using Starratt’s (1991, 1996) ethics of care, justice and critique reveals the ethical considerations and challenges a chosen solution needs to address. The result is a proposed solution to the PoP that focuses on organizational learning using Kolb’s (2015) EL theory. Embedding this organizational learning in GU’s existing quality assurance academic review framework will formalize the process. The model for improvement (Langley et al., 1994; Langley et al., 2009; Moen & Norman, 2009) guides the implementation, monitoring and evaluation, and communication plans to ensure continuous improvement of the chosen solution.
Keywords: Experiential learning, Continuous improvement, Quality assurance, Distributed-adaptive leadershi
Supporting Effective School Board Governance
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The contextual landscape for superintendents in Alberta is changing. Managing the board was once the main responsibility of the superintendent. With the implementation of the superintendent leadership quality standard, superintendents are now expected to demonstrate a number of competencies as part of their role. One major competency is supporting effective governance practices of the board they serve. This Organizational Improvement Plan (OIP) addresses the Problem of Practice (PoP) focused on building superintendent and trustee efficacy in moving towards more effective governance practices. The objective of this OIP is to introduce a new approach to governing which will result in effective governance practices. The intended outcome of developing effective governance practices is improved student success. This will require collaboration between superintendent, senior administration and the board of trustees in order for organizational change to occur, and be sustained. This process will require that trust be fostered and maintained throughout. Cultural and political factors must be taken into consideration, as well as respecting the history of the board and the jurisdiction. This will help maintain trust by the board that this change is designed to help them improve, as this process will challenge trustees to engage in significant changes to how they operate as a board and how they work with each other and the superintendent. It is recognized that this process will take time, and will utilize a leadership from the middle approach. Implementing a new approach to governance however will provide benefit to students and staff for many years to come
Improving Academic English Proficiency of Chinese International Students
Get PDFThis Organizational Improvement Plan (OIP) focuses on how an English for academic purposes (EAP) program launched by Vancouver Urban College (VUC; a pseudonym) can assist Chinese international students (CISs) in meeting their acculturation challenges and closing the achievement gap for studying in the Canadian academic context. This change initiative is in response to the external student demographic change in Canada and the internal context, including the organization’s vision, its mission, and the strategic plan with a joint focus on building a culturally responsive and inclusive school. A tripod of culturally responsive school leadership (CRSL), transformational leadership, and transformative leadership, grounded in equity and social justice and targeted at the unique learning needs of CISs, provides a guide to shaping the school and classroom education to live up to the school’s vision, which is reflected in its mission statement as ‘we think, we share, we change’ (Strategic Planning of VUC, 2019). The proposed solution is to develop an EAP curriculum focusing on content-based instruction (CBI) as an approach to improving the academic English literacy and intercultural competence (IC) of learners. In implementing the change, a combined framework of Cawsey et al.’s (2016) change path model and Kotter’s (1996) eight stage model of organizational change is applied to guide the process. Finally, a monitoring and evaluation plan based on Deming’s (1993) plan-do-study-act (PDSA) model will be utilized to assess the change implementation and how it can be used to strategically close the achievement gaps of CISs and immigrant students of Chinese origin
Culturally-Responsive Canadian Postsecondary Performance Measurement
Get PDFStudent success has multiple meanings; however, the postpositivist bias prevalent in Canadian postsecondary education restricts how student success is defined and measured. When we standardize measures of student success we assume that the student experience is homogeneous and risk implementing policies and programs based on insufficient information. Unless new evaluation approaches are adopted, it is unlikely postsecondary institutions will generate the knowledge and wisdom needed to serve their regional, national, and international learners and communities. Postsecondary education leaders must be cognizant of the legacy of colonialism and consider cultural congruency between performance measurement systems and local context. This organizational improvement plan proposes a theory of action model for culturally-responsive postsecondary performance measurement that leverages shared governance through participatory, emergent, and appreciative processes and qualitative evaluation methodologies. Perception and socially constructed norms play a pivotal role in addressing the postsecondary education sector’s quantitative bias; therefore, an interpretivist lens is used to critically examine the cultural appropriateness of quality assurance and measurement processes at a Canadian university. Culturally-responsive performance measurement requires consideration of diverse worldviews and methodologies. Qualitative evaluation can amplify the lived experiences of students and inform complex policy issues through examination of phenomena and local variability. The next generation of quality assurance requires inclusive decision-making structures to generate collective wisdom and cultivate an ethic of community by engaging community members, faculty, staff, and students as change agents
Reconceptualising the Instructional Roles of Academic Librarians in Order to Better Serve Underserved Students at a California Public University
Get PDFThe need to equip society with information literacy (IL) has become essential, as evidenced by the 2016 and 2020 U.S. elections, COVID 19 pandemic, and QAnon. A deficiency in information provenance and credibility, combined with internet users’ poor information-seeking habits, has fostered the perfect environment for misinformation. In this atmosphere, higher education institutions (HEIs) must take the lead in developing a citizenry with the necessary IL skills to make informed judgments. The need to impart IL is even more crucial among the underserved student population (i.e., low-income, first-generation college students, and students of colour) who suffer from a deficiency in IL, because of the digital divide, when arriving at HEIs. The problem of practice (PoP) addressed here concerns the impact of Golden State Academy – Valley (GSA-V) not implementing an academic librarian (AL) taught IL credit-bearing course, crucial for its large underserved student population. GSA-V continues to underutilize its AL concerning the development of such courses, despite their expertise in IL and the literature demonstrating the positive impact on academic success. As a proponent of the critical paradigm, I envision this PoP as an opportunity for empowering marginalized voices. Using Kotter’s eight-stage process, combined with distributed and servant leadership principles, this Organizational Improvement Plan (OIP) proposes the development of an experimental AL-taught IL credit-bearing course. The aim is to utilize this course as an entryway for improving AL instructional roles and developing the IL skills of GSA-V’s underserved student population. The hope is that the experimental course can act as a catalyst for creating a general education IL requirement, thereby significantly increasing the reach and impact of such instruction
Examining a Free Community-Based Physical Activity Program for Children in Rural Southwestern Ontario
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