Spring 1998
Vol 6 Issue 2
IN THIS ISSUE...
New Alignments in Calculus Instruction
Change: Do We Really Have a Choice?
Change, Learning, and the Future.
...the Learning Continues
Using a Student's Fund of Knowledge to Guide Discovery
You Say You Want and Evolution?
SEE ALSO...
The Labyrinth
Maricopa Center for Learning and Instruction
learning@maricopa.edu...The Learning Cotinues!
By Jackie Moran & Naomi Story
The learning initiative taking place at Maricopa continues to make headway. Last
fall, the initiative was bolstered by the publication of the paper, "learning@maricopa.edu".
Authored by two faculty members, Bob Bendotti (PVCC) and Donna Tannehill (RSC), the
paper serves to stimulate the dialogue on learning and to encourage actions that
would solidify learning as a core value throughout the Maricopa Community College
system.
learning@maricopa.edu is one of the results of our ACE (American Council on Education)
Project Team on Leadership and Institutional Transformation. This faculty-based team
inherited the challenge of implementing learning as the core value of our system.
An earlier document, "Maricopa Roundtable Policy Draft," provided the initial
catalyst for strategic conversations in our institutional transformation. However,
the project team realized quickly that few among our faculty had a chance to review
and discuss its merits.
Between October 1996 and early spring of 1997, faculty throughout Maricopa were engaged
in discourse on the initial roundtable document. Responses were collected and, in
the summer of 1996, Bendotti and Tannehill reviewed thirty-six responses from across
the district. Those responses became the starting point of a discussion on what learning
means at Maricopa and the basis for learning@maricopa.edu. Everyone at Maricopa appeared
to be interested in the dialogue on learning and incorporating learning in a more
holistic way. But the MCCD as a whole seemed to lack a coherent and sustainable system
that could foster such a dialogue and allow for action toward a learning-centered
organization.
learning@maricopa.edu offers three primary areas of consideration that could assist
in creating such a coherent and sustainable system. The first embraces a systems
perspective, which asks every individual to consider how his/her own work affects
and is affected by the larger systems that surround it.
The second area recognizes that developing shared meanings is essential. With that
in mind, the authors offer several characteristics of learning for readers to consider.
The characteristics include stating that learning is complex, transformational, natural
and life-long, multi-level, fundamentally personal yet also social, active and interactive,
measurable, and that learning is greatly influenced by organizational factors, including
leadership, culture, and structures. Each of these areas are discussed briefly in
the paper.
The third area learning@maricopa.edu considers is action. The action that the paper
suggests encourages us to go beyond the rhetoric or definition of learning. For example,
we should question and assess our current systems, processes or structures. We should,
then, reform those that are barriers to learning.
The paper concludes by encouraging readers to continue the dialogue throughout their
colleges and the MCCD. The ACE Project Team has set in motion a plan to do just that.
Last November, shortly after the paper began to be distributed among the colleges,
South Mountain became the first MCCD college to host an Open Space Forum on learning.
This forum incorporated the Open Space Technology method, which allowed participants
to identify and discuss their issues and notions about learning as well as their
inspired directions and commitment to action.
Some of the issues that participants raised included integrated learning communities,
academic class structure (scheduling, credits, load hours), convenience at the risk
of learning, how FTSE drives structure, and the faculty as learner. Participants
also suggested individual and organizational actions such as questioning new delivery
methods and contributing to their soundness, convening a district-wide forum to assess
what has and hasn't worked in learning communities, exploring different loading for
the multi-level developmental educational community, working in concert with others
on FTSE reform, and being a model of lifelong professional learning.
Overall, participants enjoyed the Open Space method and encouraged its use at other
Forums. The success of the South Mountain meeting has led to additional forums which
will be scheduled. On February 20, Mesa Community College held its own Open Space
Forum, and a GateWay Forum is scheduled for April 7.
The ultimate goal of the ACE Project Team is to transform the institution, the Maricopa
system, and to make learning a true and authentic core value for everyone. learning@maricopa.edu
is one of the catalysts. The other is the Open Space Forum. Clearly, the ultimate
outcome will be evidenced by each of us making decisions and choices based on learning.
We encourage everyone -- students, faculty, Governing Board members, staff, administrators,
and our extended constituents and partners -- to read the paper and to join the discourse,
so that we can together recast our system to be a truly authentic learning-centered
system. As one participant at SMCC said, "We just need to do it."
See more at the learning@maricop.edu web site:
http://www.mcli.dist.maricopa.edu/learning/