the importance of effective transitions: school to work and hs to college

© David E. Goldberg 2009

The Importance of Effective Transitions: LER 590 - UE, Week 6: School to Work & High School to College

David E. GoldbergIESE, IFoundry, and School of Labor and Employment RelationsUniversity of Illinois at Urbana-ChampaignUrbana, Illinois 61801 [email protected]

mailto:[email protected]


Transitions as Magic Moments

• Transitions are special:– Attention high.– Something new expected.– Often managed poorly.– Sets tone for whole experience.

• HR responsible for onboarding:– Bureaucratic nightmare of

forms and rules.– Answer to needs & meeting

positive expectations.


Roadmap

• School-to-work transition research overview by Russ Korte.

• iFoundry as system to enable effective transition from high school to engineering school.– Appropriate to unleashing category creating engineer

of the 21st century.– Organizational design.– Conceptual design.– Aspirational design.– Fa09 results with 73 freshmen in twelve departments.

• Final exam and presentations.


Russell Korte

• Russell Korte, Assistant Professor, Human Resource Education.

• Education: BS Education, St. Cloud State U, MBA, St Thomas, PhD (2007), Work & HR Education, U. Minnesota.

• Industrial career in advertising and consulting.• Joined UIUC faculty (HRE) in 2008.• investigating and understanding the social

dynamics of learning and working in organizations.

• Study the socialization experiences of newly hired engineers; specifically how they learned the social norms, that is, the unwritten rules of the organizations they joined.


iFoundry

• Illinois Foundry for Innovation in Engineering Education.

• It started with a conversation about creativity.• 3 elements:– Organizational change: Overcoming NIMBY problem.– Conceptual change: Overcoming coldwar mindset.– Aspirational change: Unleashing student aspirations

and choice.• Fa09: 73 freshmen take the cure.• Getting the Olin effect on a budget.

It Started with

A Conversation about Creativity

• Working on an NSF ERC proposal and discussing educational component involving creativity and innovation.

• “Why don’t we teach this stuff to all our students?”

• But how? Engineering education surprisingly resistant to top-down reform. Andreas Cangellaris



Academic Change is a NIMBY Problem

Academic NIMBY problem.NIMBY = Not in my backyard.“It is OK to change the

curriculum…”“….just don’t change MY

course.”Politics of logrolling: You

support my not changing. I support your not changing.

Even though agreement for change is widespread, specific changes are resisted.

Not a Committee, A Pilot Program

• Illinois Foundry for Innovation in Engineering Education (iFoundry):– Curriculum change incubator. Permit change.– Collaboration. Large, key ugrad programs work

together. Easier approval if shared. – Connections. Hook to depts, NAE, ABET (?), industry. – Volunteers. Enthusiasm for change among

participants. – Existing authority. Use signatory authority for

modification of curricula for immediate pilot. – Respect faculty governance. Get pilot permission

from the dept. and go back to faculty for vote after pilot change

– Assessment. Built-in assessment to overcome objections back home.

– Scalability. Past attempts at change like Olin fail to scale at UIUC and other big schools.

• Utopian curriculum change doomed. • Organizationally sensitive change has a chance.

iFoundry Circles of Influence


Engin School Version iFoundry VersionChange as local, incremental & episodic.

Change as systemic, transformative & continuing.

Isolated center/institute/dept as locus.

Dot-connecting incubator as locus.

Plan-implement as mode. Ongoing pilot & diffusion as mode.

Individual units innovate separately Units collaborate on pilots.

One size fits all & override governance during change.

Respect diversity of culture & governance during change.

Closed stagnation as usual. Open innovation as usual.

Isolated from key stakeholders. Connected to key stakeholders.

Faculty-centered process. Student-centered process.

Organizational Shifts

Role of Philosophy & the Missing Basics

• iFoundry belief: Many problems of engineering education are philosophical or conceptual.

• iFoundry led efforts to create Workshop on Philosophy and Engineering.

• First one held at TUDelft in the Netherlands.

• Series of papers undergird iFoundry efforts intellectually.

• Missing basics reflection as key to new engineer’s education.

• www.philengtech.org • fPET-2010, 9-10 May 2010, Golden

CO.

Socrates & the Missing Basics


http://www.philengtech.org/

From Category Enhancer to Creator

• Usual: Engineer as narrow & specialized category enhancer in hierarchical, domestic organization.

• Paradigm OK for WW2 & Cold War.• Now a creative era, a flat world. • Missed revolutions since WW2:

– Quality revolution.– Entrepreneurial revolution.– IT revolution.

• Here: engineer as interdisciplinary, integrative category creator in flat, global organization.


From Applied Math-Science to Qual-Quant Balance

• Usual: Qualitative skills developed in humanities & SS courses make “well-rounded” or “cultured” individuals.

• Here: Missing basics essential to being a great engineer.

• Seek qual-quant balance to make great engineers.


Cold War Version iFoundry VersionPostwar stability Missed revolutions

Category enhancer Category creator

“The basics” The “missing basics”

Narrow specialist Dynamic T

Rigor = math/science rigor Rigor = conceptual rigor

Soft skills mysterious Soft skills enumerable, learnable & rigorous

Math-Sci death march: passage rite Design challenge: passage rite

Engineers as socially captive Engineers as visionaries or leaders

Summary: Conceptual Shifts


Reflection I

• iFoundry working on transitions from school to school.

• What lessons can we learn for transitions from college to work?

• Make short list of organizational & conceptual change modes appropriate to workplace transition.


Student Aspirations & the Olin Effect

• Students involved in iFoundry planning from beginning.

• Sp08, ENG498 - Designing the Engineering Curriculum of the Future.

• Went to Franklin W. Olin College first time February 2008.

• A moving experience: Talked to freshmen during heat-sink measurements.– Pride in design-build prowess:

Engineering identity.– Confidence.– Assertion of personal aspirations

related to engineering education.• Envisioned distant day when we saw

“Olin effect” at Illinois.

Franklin W. Olin College of Engineering

iFoundry as a College Activity & the OIP

• Dean Adesida made iFoundry a college activity in Fa08.

• Immediately signed the Olin-Illinois Partnership (OIP) on 12 September 2008.

• Importance of community conversation: Rick Miller, President of Olin.

Ilesanmi Adesida

Richard K. Miller


The Joy(s) of Engineering (JoE)

• These misconceptions block achieving the joy of engineering qua engineering.

• Engineering reduced to merely technical analysis vs. engineering as creative, integrative enterprise serving human needs.

• 3 iFoundry student aspirations:– Create cool technology (products & services)– Wannabe the next Max Levchin (entrepreneurial).– Want to create sustainable world & solve societal problems

(service)• New class: ENG 100 ++, Intro to Missing Basics of Engineering.

http://ifoundry.illinois.edu/files/2009/08/Syllabus-ENG-198-Fall09.pdf

From JoE to JoC (Joy of Community)

• Cliché of cold war engineering education.• Engin profs used to say the following:– “Look to your left. Look to your right.”– “One of the three of you won’t make it!”

• Statistically correct: 50%-70% survive.• Pedagogically improper. • Why take pride in failure of capable students?• Assumption: “Rugged individuals” must survive

selective “weed out” process to be successful.

Research Shows Otherwise

• Russ Korte’s work on transitions:– College to work– HS to College

• Single most important variable in transition success social connectedness (SC).

• Critical element of iFoundry is what we call iCommunity.

Russell Korte


iCommunity

• Student-run learning community.

• iLaunch with team ropes course in Fall 2009.

• 73 students in 4 iTeams, elected iChairs.

• Cooperate to perform 4 functions: academics, service, social/identity, world of work.

• iLaunch/iCheckpoint/iExpo• Each team supported by iFA,

iSA, and iCOA

• 4 iTeams aligned with student aspirations:– Art & engineering

design (AED).– Services & systems

engineering (SSE).– Entrepreneurship &

innovation (EI).– Engineering in service

of society (ESS).

Look to Left & Right: iFoundry Version

• Try it again:– Look to your left. Look to your right.– In iFoundry those two people crucial supporters

to help you complete a challenging learning experience.

• iLaunch is primarily about the joy of community.• Not an accident that we start with this.• iCommunity calculus: How can we form a supportive

group and become great engineers together?

What Needed for Joy of Community?

• What skills necessary to become tight knit supportive community?– Need to probe and ask questions of others.– Need to label challenging people problems.– Need to create and communicate.

• You need the missing basics!!!• Joy of community, teamwork, leadership,

facilitated by mastery of the missing basics.

Teaching: Another Blast from the Past

• In old model, students were passive vessels.• Professors poured knowledge into their brains.• Assumes static world of engineers as category enhancers.• Three flavors of iStudent as category creators:– Cool new technology.– Entrepreneurs & innovators.– Working with developing cultures.

• Common thread: Need to create new stuff & need to keep learning.

• Learning in creative era is never ending enterprise.

Research on Tech Visionaries as Clue

• Helpful to look at extreme exemplars of success.

• Price, Vojak, & Griffin have done work on tech visionaries (TVs).

• TV creates bottom line revenue from new products & services.

• T-shaped person both broad and deep.

• TVs are dynamic Ts.• Do deep dive in unfamiliar area to

make new products.Ray Price

How to Be a Joyful Lifelong Learner?

• What skills do you need to be a dynamic T or lifelong learner?– Need to ask framing questions.– Need to learn lingo of new areas

& connect to things understood.– Need to collect data in new

situation.– Need to come up with creative

solutions appropriate to situation.

• You guessed it. The missing basics are the key.

Teaching Company www.teach12.com

http://www.teach12.com/

A Vision with Systemic Coherence

• Taken together three joys—JoE, JoC, JoL—can help align engineering education with the times.

• Missing basics tie all three together: Critical & creative thinking skills cut across joy of engineering, community & learning.

• iCommunity provides social connectedness to provide student self-reliance and commitment.

• So how’s it work?

Fa09 & iLaunch: The Students are Coming

• 22 August 2009 was iLaunch.• 93 students admitted, 88 came

to campus, 73 still in program.• iLaunch signaled different kind

of program.– 3 Joys: Joy of engineering,

community & learning.– Unified by the missing

basics.– Within student-run

community of learners: iCommunity.

• But it wasn’t all smooth.

iStudents on Allerton low ropes course


Bumps, Confusion, then Demos & iCheckpoint

• Students: What do you want us to do?

• iFoundry staff: Don’t know. What do you want to do?

• Then steam engines worked. • iCheckpoint held.• Something seemed to click.• Jaime Kelleher: “Wasn’t sure you

were serious about us doing what we wanted to do, but then realized you were, and it was very cool.”


Students Speak: The Experience is Working

• November 11th survey, First two weeks versus now.– Five-point Likert scale. Percentages

of agree and strongly agree. – Understood/stand the iFoundry

vision: 12% 76%

– Understood/stand iCommunity: 29% 75.5%

– Understood/stand ENG198: 57% 88%

– Felt/feel iFoundry valuable academics & professionally: 69% 80%

– Felt/feel iFoundry valuable in student connections:

84% 88%

• Your words:– “Sure I made the right career

choice.” – “I might not like my future co-

workers, but I’ll love my job.”– “Making me more confident in my

decision to be an engineer.” – “I’m definitely more

entrepreneurial.” – “I think I feel more comfortable

being an engineer.” – “Just an overall all-rounded

engineer, not just a technician. A human, not just a problem solver.”

– “The future looks brighter thanks to iFoundry.”


Asserted Themselves as iTeams & Individuals

• Started to assert themselves.

• iTeams got plans matched with available time.

• Individuals started to do interesting things.

• Things freshmen at Illinois don’t usually do.


AAAs: Aspirationally Assertive Acts

• started to assert themselves as free men and women and as engineers:– 6 students go to NextGen

conference.– 3 students apply and get

accepted to TEC Silicon Valley trip.

– Student rearranges finals to go to Indonesia with NUS students.

– Student networks with Cory Levy to get VC interview in Colorado.

• The data and the stories told us we were getting Olin effect at Illinois!

Cory Levy setting up at NextGen


Got the Olin Effect at Illinois!

• But how?– Didn’t change the whole

curriculum.– Didn’t build new buildings.– Didn’t remake the

classrooms.– Didn’t overhaul the

teaching or teachers.– One-hour course +

iCommunity?• Did trust student judgment &

aspirations.

The Big I at Olin College


Why Did This Work So Well?

• We trusted and supported students in 8 ways:– Met expectations of change in transition (iLaunch).– Appealed to passion (3 joys).– Respected aspirations & choices (iTeam themes).– Built qualitative thinking skills (Roam + missing basics + HAPI).– Insisted on working together (iTeams & iCommunity).– Trusted student initiative (provided rules & structure, but not

instructions)– Unleashed inner builder & engineering identity (Steam engine &

μcontroller).– Began with the end in mind (world of work and iCOAs).

• Leads to the Illinois Way of engineering education transformation: Organizational design + conceptual rigor + student aspirations & trust.



Reflection II

• Am working on transitions from school to school.• What lessons can we learn for transitions from

college to work?• Make short list of aspirational changes

appropriate to workplace.


Next Steps

• Scale up as iEFX.• Mentornet• Pilots in the Spring.• Sophomore rollouts.• Next four years.

JoyAspiration

Choice Identity

Illinois Engineering Freshman Experience

(iEFX)


Next Semester

• World of work becomes key emphasis: Summer internships and aspirational activities.

• Mentornet launch for iFoundry: one-on-one mentoring with industry volunteers.

• Courses: Pilots of Foundations of Business & Entrepreneurship (FBE) & User-Oriented Collaborative Design (UOCD) for 2010-2011 launch.

• HAPI themes and new LibEd courses.• Kevin Wolz and Passionate Pursuits.• Other crosscutting activities.• iTeams and projects continue as

extracurricular activity.

http://www.mentornet.net/


http://www.mentornet.net/

Next Year

• Roll out of new courses (UOCD and FBE) as swappable iFoundry options.

• Projects and iTeams continue as independent RSOs if desired.

• Social membership continues in iCommunity. • Join regular engineering student life, run for

office.• Hire experienced iFoundry hands as iEFX ELAs.


In Four Years

• More student choice and respect/support for student aspirations.

• Design throughout the curriculum.• Industrially sponsored design across college.• Pervasive community and teamwork at Illinois.• Culture of change and curriculum innovation.• Graduation of the class of 2013: Engineering

leaders on national or international stage.


Engin School Version iFoundry VersionCollege similar to high school College profoundly different from HS

Engineering joyless rational application of math & science

Engineering joyful creative invention of technoogical artifacts & systems

One size fits all as chosen by faculty Student aspirations/choices different

Quantitative skills largely sufficient Qual-Quant balance essential

Students as individual learners Students as community of learners

Faculty control as critical element Student initiative as critical element

Engineering identity develops in time

Unleash engineering identity now

Begin with math-science death march

Begin with end in mind (world of work)

Aspirational Shifts

Bottom Line

• Started with a conversation about creativity.• Became system to actualize organizational and conceptual

change.• Quickly became way – to trust student judgment – support student aspirations– Respect student choice– & develop student engineering identity.

• Reflection on why it was effective may help HR professionals design better organizational, conceptual, and aspirational support.
