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Polytechnic Instructors as Scholars: Developing a Culture that Embraces Scholarly Activity
Get PDFThis Organizational Improvement Plan (OIP) proposes a leadership solution to develop a culture that embraces faculty scholarly activity at a large Canadian polytechnic institution. The recent advent of two baccalaureate degrees at this diploma-offering institute brought with it the provincial government stipulation that faculty teaching in degree programs must be continually engaged in scholarly activity. A previous unsuccessful implementation of this requirement addressed the functional, managerial aspects of conducting research, however faculty were unprepared for the cultural shift necessary to transform them from polytechnic instructors to scholarly polytechnic instructors. Though the requirement to research remains, early attempts at support have been abandoned, leaving degree faculty and their academic chairs adrift.
By creating a centralized institutional research hub and involving stakeholders in the process, material and informational supports would then help shift the scholarly culture towards acceptance and compliance. This OIP underscores the importance of following a prescribed change leadership process that considers both the strategic and cultural aspects of change (Bolman & Deal, 2013; Harris, 1996; Kezar, 2014; Martin, 1992: Prosci, 2016). It couches these ideas and proposals in consideration of the existing, predominant governance structure at the institute, one of transformational, distributed, and ethical leadership (Gaubatz & Ensminger, 2015; House, 1971; Kidder, 1995; Kotter, 2007; Northouse, 2016).
This OIP may be adapted to similar contexts at similar institutions, as well as to other change leadership problems where the tendency has been to focus on strategy rather than strategy + cultural change.
Keywords: scholarly activity, research, culture, faculty, instructors, polytechnic, problem of practice, transformational leadership, distributed leadershi
DEVELOPING BETTER PARTNERSHIPS IN A FAMILY HEALTH TEAM
Get PDFThis organizational improvement plan (OIP) considers the experience of an Ontario family health team whose growing portfolio of partnerships requires evidence-based structure. A brief review of the literature suggests that partnerships are best understood as social constructs, shared spaces that are co-created through the multiple perspectives of their contributors. Synthesis of competing perspectives, integration, is a recurring theme throughout the OIP. Two well-known organizational change models are integrated to create a system change model (SCM) more applicable to the system-level change inherent to healthcare partnerships and this OIP. SCM is supported by an integrated approach to leadership, the incorporation of two leadership theories that value different types of relationships, one within systems (complexity), and the other between people (authentic). Four potential solutions are presented, and a preferred option identified: adopting and adapting a partnership framework for multi-sectoral collaboration by integrating Relational Coordination where communication and relationship-building could support task integration across partner organizations. A test of change partnership using one of the family health team’s most ambitious collaborations is identified, and a supporting change implementation plan described using the SCM framework. The OIP was authored during a time of significant transformation in Ontario’s healthcare system, sometimes giving the writing process the feel of field reporting. As such, it is likely that the healthcare landscape will change again, rendering the concepts of this OIP more applicable to the author’s practice than any specifics in the implementation plan
The Relatedness of Leadership to Infant Education and Care: A Journey with Hannah Arendt
Get PDFIn current movements that seek to redress the early education and care sector, professionals who work with infants are gaining recognition for possessing a unique set of expertise and competencies that extend beyond custodial caregiving. In this emerging recognition however, the relatedness between leadership and infant caregiving is dearth in early years research, policy, and practice agendas. This phenomenon is evidenced in course outcomes, content, and experiential elements in an Ontario early years honours leadership degree. As such, this Organizational Improvement (OIP) plan endeavours to tangibly intersect leadership and infant caregiving by examining contextual informants relating to this problem of practice. Care, an ethics of care, and the problematic past of leadership and infant caregiving are deliberated. Trust and care are likewise surveyed and posited as main to actioning the change necessitated to more closely ally leadership with infant caregiving in preservice academic and experiential degree learning.
Leadership in this change plan is conjectured as twofold granted that it is not only central to the momentum necessitated to action change, but also to the de-coupling that resides between leadership and infant caregiving in the postsecondary program affixed to this OIP. The mutually complementary qualities that exist between relational leadership and infant caregiving, apprised by Arendt’s interwoven theories of natality, plurality, and action, is argued as a fitting theoretical stance to underpin this plan. Principal to proposed solutions is stakeholder readiness and responses, most notably those of infants and future infant caregiving leaders. Mainstay to this OIP are strategies to navigate change which are inclusive of Empowerment Evaluation and relationally-based communication. Ultimately, this Organizational Improvement Plan advocates for pre-service early education and care students to engage in degree level learning that incites deconstruction, reflection, and revisioning of narratives that locate infant caregiving within a relational leadership paradigm
Global Competency and International Context at Aspiring Public Charter School
Get PDFTeaching and assessing global competencies are areas of research that have become the focus of many educational organizations. This organizational improvement plan (OIP) examined the problem of a lack of global competencies taught, and international context provided, in an urban Canadian public school. The internal and external contextual landscape of the organization were considered, and available data analyzed to establish the need and readiness for change. Four primary solutions are proposed to solve this problem of practice: status quo and communication, international programs, strategic partnerships, and global competency education. Relying on contextual knowledge that connects the theories of servant, authentic, and distributed leadership with the change path model and the four frames of leadership, an organizational change framework has been developed. This framework, the Change Climb, will need to be tested and evaluated within a variety of institutions in order to accurately assess its adaptability and success. The hope would be that it becomes a flexible and effective tool to facilitate deliberate change in any organization. This OIP also describes a plan for measuring, monitoring, and evaluating change by employing the Lean Startup methodology
Case 5 : Active Schools: A Method to Combat Sedentary Behaviour?
Get PDFAfter a phone call from Jessica Myles, a concerned principal, Amelia Brooks, the Director of Education with Maple Leaf District School Board, decided she needed to reduce sedentary behaviour among many students in her district. As she approached the end of her term as Director of Education, Amelia realized that if she wanted to take action and combat sedentary behaviour, the time was now. As a trained health promoter, Amelia knows the benefits and evidence around Active Schools, not just in improving physical activity, but also in supporting a culture of inclusive physical activity. Most Active Schools aim to promote a culture of inclusive physical activity, providing high-quality physical education and encouraging students to partake in 60 minutes or more of moderate-to-vigorous physical activity (MVPA) each day (Whitehead & Talbot, 2015). Active Schools programs support high quality physical education and encourage students to partake in 60 minutes or more of physical activity each day (Whitehead, MacCallum & Talbot, 2015). The Active School model also has the potential to decrease the levels of sedentary behaviour and physical inactivity in elementary students. Amelia needs to prepare a proposal for an upcoming board meeting that will be attended by key stakeholders. She needs to balance stakeholder interest while keeping the goal of active children central. In order to pass the motion to incorporate Active Schools activities into Maple Leaf District School Board programs, Amelia requires more than 50% of supportive votes from the Board of Trustees. Given the diversity of stakeholders and their range of perspectives and priorities (Board of Trustees, student trustees, and parent and teacher representatives) Amelia realizes the importance of her task
Case 7 : Population Health Surveillance in Finland: Threats to Historically Dependable Surveillance Methodology
Get PDFThe case outlines the challenges that the National Institute for Health and Welfare in Helsinki, Finland is facing in light of an ongoing national health care reform. The health care reform has taken precedence over other research activities, and the Institute is anticipating changes to population health surveillance methods. The Institute elected a new Director General in the fall of 2018 who will influence decisions about which population surveillance data collection methods are used. The Health Monitoring Unit at the Institute fears that the Director General will decide that all surveillance data will be collected using administrative patient registries with the consequent elimination of population health surveys. The team responsible for the 2017 National FinHealth population health survey must determine how they can advocate for the continued use of survey data in population health surveillance
Case 13 : Sustainable mHealth Innovations - Repurposing The Collective Comfort Pilot Project
Get PDFThe Collective Comfort project (CC project) is a mobile health (mHealth) pilot project created by the Digital Innovation team in the Education Department at the Centre for Addiction and Mental Health (CAMH). The CC project provides safe, online social support networks—a crucial social determinant of health—that are accessible everywhere to people who have anxiety disorders.
Unfortunately, funding has come to an end for this pilot project. CAMH’s Director of Education, Heather Grohl, and her team are tasked with repurposing the CC project mobile application for three organizations—the Alzheimer Society of Toronto, Homeless Hub, and Veterans Affairs Canada. These organizations are seeking a digital innovation that would allow their social support groups to be accessed through mobile phones. However, Heather’s boss, the President of CAMH Education, has only approved pitching to one organization. Therefore, her team must divide into three smaller teams to develop a proposal appropriate for each organization. The pitch will consist of a user persona, problem scenarios, user stories, and a prototype that is based on the CC project’s template design. Each pitch will be specifically tailored to the respective organization’s unique needs. The teams are also expected to develop one new innovative feature for the mHealth application that they believe would be useful for their specific organization. For example, an application for the Homeless Hub could incorporate a feature that displays homeless shelters in the area. Each of the teams will then present their prospective pitches to Heather and the President of CAMH Education, who will together decide the winning proposal based on which one best balances both creativity and feasibility
Ch. 18 - In Defense of the Work of Art: I and Thou in Music Education
Get PDFA change has been going on in both the philosophy of music education and the general philosophy of music during the last decades: a transition from a focus on music as an object or work to a focus on music as an activity and process. This certainly contrasts with the historical hegemony of the (Western) idea of music as objects. As a philosophical development this is unproblematic. However, a fundamental prerequisite for moving encounters between the human subject and music, in music education as well as in general, is the very idea of music as a work of art. This does not mean that music is to be considered solely as an object. The musical work of art is to be considered as both a subject and an object: a part-person-part-thing. In this chapter such ideas are discussed related to writings by Bohlman, Elliott and Small, romanticism, Benjamin’s aura concept, Buber’s encounter concept, and Aristotle’s discussion of happiness