Using educational technology as an institutional teaching and learning improvement strategy?
Increasingly, educational technology is identified as crucial to addressing many scale issues around higher education learning and teaching. However, such projects are often run with the technical project goals achieved but the educational goals unrealised. Further, in an age of austerity, all investments must be closely scrutinised as to their efficacy in meeting their intended goals. To what extent can educational technology be used as a management tool to enable and promote institution-level change in learning and teaching as a strategic goal? This paper reports on use of the Resources, Activity, Support and Evaluation (RASE) model at an Australian university in its move from an incumbent to a new ‘learning management system’ coupled with judicious use of inflection points introduced to drive educational change across a whole institution and to model and report on that change.
Strategies for Integrating and Sustaining Disruptive Innovations in Small Businesses
Strategies for Integrating and Sustaining Disruptive Innovations in Small Businesses by Robert Allen MS, Florida Institute of Technology, 2003 BS, Oakwood University, 2000 Doctoral Study Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Business Administration Walden University August 2018 Abstract The evolution of technology has led to a need for business leaders to embrace disruptive technology for the purpose of capturing new markets and remaining competitive. Multiple challenges have been faced by business leaders in the processes of integrating and sustaining disruptive innovations, resulting in the failure to achieve expected efficiency and profitability. The purpose of this multiple case study was to exploreThe evolution of technology has led to a need for business leaders to embrace disruptive technology for the purpose of capturing new markets and remaining competitive. Multiple challenges have been faced by business leaders in the processes of integrating and sustaining disruptive innovations, resulting in the failure to achieve expected efficiency and profitability. The purpose of this multiple case study was to explore strategies used by business leaders to integrate and sustain disruptive innovations. The conceptual frameworks were Roger’s diffusion of innovation theory and Christensen’s disruptive innovation theory. Semistructured interviews were administered to 10 business leaders and employees from institutions of higher learning in the Northeastern region of the United States. The participants were selected using a purposive nonrandom sampling technique. The selection criteria included organizational leaders, technology professionals, training and development professionals, and organizational end-users. Three themes and several subthemes were identified. The strategies for integrating and sustaining disruptive innovations include training, changeover mechanisms, and the use of critical resources. The procedural and structural factors in processes to integrate and sustain disruptive innovations include identifying critical success factors, ascertaining benchmarks, determining levels of support and effectiveness. Obstacles faced during the processes of integrating and sustaining disruptive innovations were categorized into human, technology, changeover, and external issues. Social change may be realized through the improved success rates of small business leaders implementing disruptive innovations by increasing meaningful employment and enhancing livelihoods. Strategies for Integrating and Sustaining Disruptive Innovations in Small Businesses by Robert Allen MS, Florida Institute of Technology, 2003 BS, Oakwood University, 2000 Doctoral Study Submitted in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Business Administration Walden University August 2018 Dedication I dedicate this dissertation to sons Robert, Cameron, and Panji Allen for their unconditional love and support. I would like to also dedicate this dissertation to Adonna DeSouza and the rest of the DeSouza family. To my mother, Cynthia Allen, and my brother, Rodney Allen, thank you for not only believing in me, but for always being there to support my academic endeavors, despite a bitter divorce process that nearly cost me my dream of becoming the first and only academic doctor in our family. I give praises to our Lord and savior, and to Oakwood University, a Seventh Day Adventist Institution of Higher Learning, from which the foundations of my academic and Christian followings where derived from. Finally, I dedicate this dissertation to President Barack Obama, who inspired not only me, but many of us as minorities to say, “Can we do it? Yes, We Can!” Acknowledgments Primarily, I would like to thank those who made a significant contribution in my life through mentoring and coaching, as well as providing me with the much-needed support and academic guidance to reach the highest level of education one can achieve. Thank you, Dr. Gregory Uche, my committee chair, for pushing me to the limits, being patient, and having faith in me. To my second committee chair, Dr. Jim R. Glenn, URR Dr. Rocky Dwyer, and DBA Program Director Dr. Susan Davis, I would like to thank you all for setting the bar high through academic rigor, constructive feedback, and consistency. Special thanks to Dr. Nicole Kirpalani and Dr. S. Baxter, who, in the beginning of this long journey, provided me with insight and guidance on researching the conceptual framework of Rogers’ diffusion of innovations theory and structuring technological innovation themes to focus on. To C3 and C4 of the Callahan family, Marianne Zipf, Marie Dolla, Dr. Edward Dee, Dr. Darryl Anderson, Dr. S. Gunther, Dr. D. Sibblis, Ms. Burns, Ms. Welsh, Dir. Fordunski, Ms. Mookram, Ms. Zerella, and the rest of the Plaza Community, thank you for your patience, your support, and for creating opportunities that foster diversity and growth, development, professionalism, and self-actualization. Lastly, I owe a debt of gratitude to my dear friends, Mrs. Oluoch Akello and her husband. Oluoch, you are truly blessed and born to be a scholar. Thank you so much for your dedicated time and unwavering support. I look forward to hopefully pursuing some joint publishing ventures with you soon. So, hurry up and get your masters and doctorates degree.
Model-Centered Instruction, the Design and the Designer
A model of instruction described by Wenger (1987) identifies three elements that are active during instruction: the mental model the instructor wishes to share with the learner, the external experience used to communicate the mental model, and the evolving mental model of the learner. Gibbons (2003a), writing in response to Seel (2003), noted this three-part description as a bridge concept relating learning and instruction. This view has important practical implications for designers of instruction. For example, Gibbons and Rogers (in press) propose that there exists a natural layered architecture within instructional designs that corresponds with instructional functions. Among these layers is the content layer, which determines the structural form in which learnable subject-matter is stored and supplied to the learner. This may include the expression of the content in terms of tasks, semantic networks, rules, or other structures. The designer’s commitment at the content layer strongly constrains all other parts of the design, making some future decisions imperative, some irrelevant, and defining the range of possibilities for still others. for designers of a model content commitment. It describes the constraints automatically placed on other layers of the design.