WE’VE OUTGROWN THE WAY WE TEACH AND LEARN It’s time to change. Here’s how. By Rishelle Wimmer, Senior Lecturer, Information Technology and Systems Management and Thomas Grundnigg, Senior Lecturer, Multi-Media Arts FH Salzburg University of Applied Sciences Faculty Innovation Fellows candidates
When presenting a scale model of his newly designed future education center, Derek Zoolander asks the question, “How can we be expected to teach children... if they can’t even fit inside the building?” For us, the building is a metaphor for our current educational structures, and the message is clear: we’ve outgrown our 20th century system of higher ed.
To initiate the change we want to see on our campus, we designed the eXploratorium — a center for the curious learner. Currently, we are engaged in a three-stepplan to realize our vision by: (1) developing options, (2) establishing a community of courage and practice, and (3) cultivating curiosity.
Objectively we wish for students to be adventurous and explore the unknown. While we harbor hope that they will acquire talents for innovation and develop the flexibility needed to navigate uncertainty, their university experience often runs contrary to those aims. Students experience limited opportunities to exercise their curiosity, and educators have few options for rewarding risk-taking. Instead we persist in offering a rigid curriculum, and evaluate progress in increments of how well learners conform to established methods. At this time, when information is ubiquitous, we need to transform the current system of higher ed into one that awakens an innate interest in learning.
STEP 1 — DEVELOPING OPTIONS
We are born curious. And curiosity is the force that drives us to learn and explore. But curiosity is fragile. Many students arrive at university with a diminished readiness to dive into new learning experiences wholeheartedly. How can we cultivate curiosity and ignite confidence to venture into the unknown? Cultivating curiosity calls for freedom to explore interests, take action, and work in a safe-space where risks can be taken and mistakes made. Even as we aspire to a new paradigm of teaching and learning, we acknowledge that change is frightening for our institutions. Challenging the status quo inevitably provokes push-back. Self-reliance is not enough, it takes a community of courage and practice to realize progress and break free from constraints. 18
Recognizing the need for students and faculty to pursue topics of interest with meaningful objectives in a variety of learning settings, the center for the curious provides space to explore teaching and learning options that complement and supplement the existing curriculum. Designed for multidisciplinary use, these settings are situated beyond current departmental structures. While some course offerings are experiential and project based in nature, others are designed to reinforce subjects commonly taught in degree programs (i.e. social competences, academic writing, research methods, digital literacy skills, project management, etc.), as well as a catalog of subjects not currently available to all degree programs (i.e. politics, economics, ethics, cultural diversity, etc.).
STEP 2 — ESTABLISHING A COMMUNITY OF COURAGE AND PRACTICE In the process of developing new learning situations, we’ve attracted educators and students invested in creating new pathways at our university. Establishing a dynamic and collaborative community of practice has been a positive side-effect of developing options. Our
