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Where
we are going: Education for the 21st Century |
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| Learning
for a Lifetime| The Learning Experience| General
Education | Internationalizing the Campus| Complete Learning Environment | Liberal Arts/Professional Programs | Graduate Education | Distance Education |
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| I
am here because I believe in the distinctive UWGB approach to education. I learned,
very clearly, that you are here for the same reason. And, as we engaged in conversation
after conversation, it became clearer to me that what we, together, believe in
and are committed to is ever more important to our students, to our State, and
to the future that it is our honor and our calling to continually create. I believe
this passionately. So do you. The UWGB approach is captured in the “Green Bay Idea.” It says: An educated person addresses problems and approaches life through multiple perspectives anchored in commitment and engagement, skills and tools, breadth and depth of knowledge, and insight and understanding. Each element is important. But, it is the “multiple-perspectives” component that distinguishes the UWGB approach. Many institutions, through breadth requirements and such, offer exposure to diverse perspectives. That is a “multidisciplinary” approach. Subjects are examined within the frameworks of established disciplines. Interdisciplinarity differs. Synthesis is sought by bringing together concepts of multiple disciplines to seek understandings that would not be possible within the limitations of any of the contributing disciplines. A whole is sought that is greater than the sum of the parts. This is the hallmark of a UWGB education. Learning for a Lifetime Why is a UWGB education ever more relevant? Today, we are preparing people for careers that do not yet exist. We are preparing them to be effective members of societies that will be facing challenges — economic, social, cultural — that we do not yet know. How can we be doing that if all we are doing is providing technical skills and information? What we know today, and what we can do today, will have rapidly diminishing relevance. Our answer at UWGB is relatively simple. Certainly, we emphasize learning how to learn. And, we emphasize engagement in society. But, on the more academic side, what will matter most in dealing with the future is the capacity to grasp the new and novel from multiple perspectives. In part, this is because the challenges that the future will bring to us, as employees and as citizens, will not respect the boundaries of the disciplines and the technologies known today. Synthesis will be necessary. I said our answer, at UWGB, is relatively simple. The concept is simple. Carrying it out is not. We continue to have the challenge, at UWGB, of assuring that our learning is really interdisciplinary rather than multidisciplinary, particularly in the general education of all our undergraduates. Do we really achieve for each of our students — and, can we demonstrate that we achieve — learning that is a synthesis of multiple disciplinary perspectives? Interdisciplinarity is our hallmark and is increasingly relevant. This much is obvious to us at UWGB. I have heard it from you. As clearly, though, I have learned that the message does not effectively reach 18-year-olds or their parents. We must not change our education approach for it is “right on.” We do need to attend to better explaining it, finding ways to do so in a few words only. How do we capture our approach in a phrase? How do we explain it in 30 words or less? Brainstorming only, for your critiques and improvements are much needed, the most effective approach I have found in my various talks has been to describe “Learning for a Lifetime” as follows: Today’s students prepare for a first job but also for careers that do not yet exist. And, for societal challenges we do not yet know. The unique University of Wisconsin-Green Bay approach provides education relevant for today and the learning abilities demanded by unpredictable tomorrows. Learning for a lifetime. Or, maybe we need to put it to potential students more directly: Do you want to be prepared for the future or do you want to prepare the future? Your improvements, alternatives, and outraged denunciations are much needed. TOP OF PAGE The Learning Experience The campus, over several years, engaged in an ambitious examination of ways to improve the total learning environment, the final proposal coming to be known as “The Learning Experience.” The proposal was designed to serve a variety of purposes: • To improve the educational experience of students and their retention through attending to the integrated learning environment (inside and outside the classroom), through restructuring our approaches to academic advising, through “high impact” first contact, through emphasis upon “learning how to learn,” and through enhancing the effectiveness of the “first-year” experience by bringing traditional UWGB strengths at the upper division to bear on learning from the very first class. • To address concerns about under-funding and high student/faculty ratios. • To distinguish UWGB and establish its distinctive “niche” within the UW System. Meeting with you, I did learn that, while there is broad support for the general principles captured in the first bullet, for others, the Learning Experience was, primarily, a stratagem for addressing chronic problems of under-funding. I learned that campus support was broad but not deep. When levels of funding associated with the Learning Experience proposal were not fully forthcoming, then issues of priorities quickly emerged: To which of the many innovative Learning Experience initiatives should the few new dollars be assigned? Actually, given the three initial purposes for the Learning Experience, we had a double shortfall. We did not realize the expected level of funding. But, we fell short of our initial ambitions in another way. The campus found it extraordinarily difficult to distinguish the various initiatives in the Learning Experience from efforts on other campuses. The Learning Experience is, certainly, the most complete set of learning innovations I have seen on any campus. UWGB is justifiably proud of such an accomplishment. However, any one of the innovations can be found on a multitude of campuses. Consequently, the Learning Experience did not fulfill our interest in defining UWGB’s niche. What is next for the Learning Experience? The initial purpose for the Learning Experience — the academically compelling ideas — remains valid and as important to the future of UWGB as when it was proposed. And, I heard from many faculty and staff who continue to want to realize the vision captured by the Learning Experience. I have not heard anybody fundamentally question the academic foundations upon which the Learning Experience was built. There continues to be credible evidence that the Learning Experience initiatives were absolutely on target. The National Survey of Student Engagement statistics show that our first-year students are not having the quality of academic experience that we intend for them. Compared to national and UW System peers, they are more likely to report troubling aspects of their classroom experiences, particularly in regard to the level of learning that is active and engaging. Our further analyses of these data show, convincingly I think, that these results cannot be explained in terms of larger class sizes. As was imbedded in the thinking of the Learning Experience, we will not fully realize our potential to improve student learning if all we do is to teach essentially in unchanged ways but to smaller classes. The same national survey data also show that, by any measure, our students’ experiences with academic advising are unsatisfactory, standard deviations away from what is found at other UW campuses and at comparable universities around the country. This holds for reports from our first-year students and our advanced students. So, when it comes to improving retention through focus upon the quality of the first-year experience and the effectiveness of academic advising, the instincts of the Learning Experience were on the mark. Right on the mark. Call it the Learning Experience or call it something else, but there are data we cannot ignore about significant academic issues we must figure out, together, how to effectively address. So, the Learning Experience is “spot on.” But, without resources, how do we get there? Not simply by adding on. That, I heard loudly and clearly. There are no more hours in people’s days. And, by the way, I think the “adding-on” instinct was one of the few weaknesses of the initial approach to the Learning Experience, although it was adding on to the academic plan instead of to people’s days. There was attention to fundamentally reforming student orientation and academic advising. From the ground up! But, the academic component appeared to me to be grafted onto an established set of academic programs and requirements rather than being fully integrated, particularly as regards the outcomes and requirements for the general education of our undergraduates. It did not appear to me that anyone had asked, “If the academic objectives of the Learning Experience are fully achieved, do we still need to do everything else that we are currently doing?” Here, I believe, we may find part of the answer to how to make progress toward the objectives appropriately targeted by the Learning Experience while doing so within more realistic assumptions about resource availability. Instead of simply adding the Learning Experience on top of the existing academic plan, it needs to be fully integrated, particularly with general education. General education is the next subject I will take up, continuing to report on the broad topic of “learning for a lifetime.” |
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General
Education Early in my discussions with the campus community, I sought to stir up interest in general education by baldly asserting that we did not have a general-education program. Instead, we had a breadth requirement without clear connections to an explicit rationale and outcomes precisely enough concocted for us to assess and continually improve attainment of the learning we expect of anybody holding a UWGB baccalaureate degree. Quickly, and appropriately, colleagues corrected my hyperbole. That was helpful to me. But, we also had some great discussions on what the role of general education should be at UWGB, and I think that will prove helpful to the campus. The General Education Council took up the challenge and is engaging the campus in further, exciting discussions. In so doing, we are actually returning to a distinguishing characteristic of our roots. I heard from a number of people here when the University began about our leading-edge approach to general education. It really was so — an integrated thematic approach, for example, where interdisciplinarity and “skills” courses were built in instead of separate requirements — and, indeed, may have been too far ahead of its time as transferability issues seemed to be serious. People also spoke to me about the great joy and the significant academic merit they found in the Liberal Education Seminars. My suggestions on general education, developed over the course of the many enjoyable discussions we have had on the subject, include the following: • Outcomes: The Learning Experience proposed a “competency-based” rather than “course-based” approach to general education. While there is much to recommend such an approach, I do not believe we will see such a fundamental transformation any time soon. Watching such efforts across the country, it is a daunting task seldom really realized. We must, though, have a set of learning outcomes precisely formulated, collegially agreed to, and regularly assessed. We have a beginning here but need refinement. General education courses can be mapped to outcomes, allowing the more traditional “course-based” general education. • Assessment and Continual Refinement: We need to regularly assess outcomes for one simple reason: We care about our students’ education. Too often over my career, I have seen us debate every pedagogical nuance of general-education reform, usually for years, finally adopt a new approach, and then never going back to see if the program is achieving the purposes we had so passionately discussed. Based upon discussions with you, I would propose that our general-education program would be stronger — and our lives simpler — were we to approach general-education reform differently. Rather than spend years trying to anticipate what will and what will not work and trying to iron out our differing hypotheses in some sort of cyclical and cataclysmic approach to general-education reform, we should simply take our best initial ideas as to what will work, including innovation, pilot tests, and “quasi-experiments” where differences of opinion occur. • First-Year Experience: Recent survey data document a troubling need to improve the quality of the experience of our first-year students inside and outside the classroom. The first-year experience needs to include both academic and academic/student support programs so the first-year experience per se does not become part of general education. But, the academic component should be. • Building on Strengths: Interdisciplinary practical problem solving is the core of our academic plan. Alumni I have met with praise what such an approach has meant to them as they went on to successful and fulfilling lives. New students do not have a clue what interdisciplinarity means or why that is important to their future success. In general education, and from the very first class, we must provide an academic experience that captures and captivates our students in the essence of our academic approach. • Complete Learning Environment: Students, particularly in their first years, learn enormously outside the classroom as well as inside. They are learning study skills and developing the maturity and responsibility essential to succeed academically and as engaged and productive alumni. They are also learning a great deal about the world around them through interaction with diverse peoples and participation in diverse opportunities for service, enrichment, and fun. I clearly heard that general education should be strictly focused upon academic experiences. I fully agree. However, the academic component — particularly general education — must be carefully integrated with programs designed to make the most of the full learning environment as we prepare students who learn how to learn, are engaged in the life of the University and the broader society, live lifestyles healthy for themselves and their society, and enjoy diverse and international perspectives. • Governance of General Education: I heard that the general-education committee should be a committee of the Faculty Senate rather than appointed by and reporting to the Provost. I completely agree. The quality of the curriculum is one of the two most fundamental responsibilities of the faculty. This is not because of some abstract “right” but, rather, because that is how universities assure the strongest possible educational program. I do believe the general-education committee should have representation from the administrative staff — general education should be a part of an integrated learning environment — and from the students. And, why not a community representative? I know the thought sounds odd. But, certainly, the community has a stake in the outcomes we expect of all baccalaureate graduates. Such a move would be a reasonable test of our commitment to “communiversity,” and such membership could add to the quality of the committee’s discussion. These are just a few themes sparked by our conversations. The faculty, collaborating with staff and student colleagues, will move far beyond these nascent notions. In doing so, I hope we would also consider ways to redirect resources so that we can engage students, from the start, in smaller problem-focused interdisciplinary courses. Today, we have a rather extensive set of general-education requirements. If we can reduce the hours required, we may be able to free up resources to enhance the quality and effectiveness of the experience. TOP OF PAGE Internationalizing the Campus In the conversations I had with you, two major trends repeatedly emerged as aspects of the changing environ-ment to which our curricula needed to be responsive. The first was the emergence of what many refer to as “the knowledge age” and here, in our academic plan, in what I am calling “learning for a lifetime,” I believe we have the answer. The second involved globalization as an economic, cultural, political, and, perhaps, even spiritual phenomenon. We had many interesting conversations about this topic, and I learned about lots of exciting developments. Our traditional international programs are strong and international perspectives are increasingly infusing curricula across the campus. Such developments need to be continued and, probably, accelerated. They have, to date, been dependent largely upon the initiative and dedication of individuals. Recognizing this, the Provost, during the 2001-02 academic year, engaged faculty and staff in preparing a very thoughtful and appropriately challenging plan for assuring continued progress. I heard other ideas related to our obligation to internationalize the campus. Our international students report excellent experiences here — on campus and in the community. Perhaps their major complaint was that we, as a campus, are not taking full advantage of their presence. They would like to see more domestic students and faculty in the International Center and would like to be involved more in the activities of the campus including classroom instruction. Faculty would like to have more help in establishing exchange programs. They also agree that one of the most effective ways to internationalize the curricula is to have faculty involved in assignments that take them abroad, perhaps as part of sabbaticals although, certainly, there are a variety of other opportunities. |
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| More EDUCATION FOR THE 21ST CENTURY | ||||
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| ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS | INTRODUCTION | THEMES | WHERE WE HAVE BEEN | FOUNDATIONS | ||||
| WHERE WE ARE GOING: Engagement | Excellence Across the Board | Education for the 21st Century | ||||
| GETTING THERE | CONCLUSIONS | CONTINUING THE DISCUSSION | SUMMARY | APPENDIX | ||||
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