Board 1: In the Business of Innovation: Development of a Canvas Tool to Promote and Sustain Pedagogical Risk Taking by Faculty

Rohini N. Abhyankar; Samantha Ruth Brunhaver; Micah Lande; Ann F. McKenna

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Conference: 2019 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition
Location: Tampa, Florida
Publication Date: June 15, 2019
Start Date: June 15, 2019
End Date: June 19, 2019
Conference Session: NSF Grantees Poster Session
Tagged Topic: NSF Grantees Poster Session
Page Count: 15
DOI: 10.18260/1-2--32160
Permanent URL: https://peer.asee.org/32160
Download Count: 518

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Paper Authors

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Rohini N. Abhyankar Arizona State University

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Rohini Abhyankar is a third year graduate student at Arizona State University’s Engineering Education Systems and Design doctoral program. Rohini has a Master’s degree in Electrical Engineering from Syracuse University and Master’s and Bachelor’s degrees in Physics from University of Delhi, India. Rohini has over ten years each of industry and teaching experience. Her dissertation focus is on understanding the strategies adopted by early career engineers to adapt to engineering workplace culture.

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Samantha Ruth Brunhaver Arizona State University

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Dr. Samantha R. Brunhaver is an Assistant Professor within The Polytechnic School, one of six schools in the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering at Arizona State University. She is a mixed-methods researcher with focus on the preparation and pathways of engineering students. Her specific research interests include engineering student persistence and career decision-making, early career engineering practice, faculty pedagogical risk-taking, and entrepreneurial mindset. She completed her B.S. in Mechanical Engineering at Northeastern University and her M.S. and Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering at Stanford University. Prior to ASU, she worked as an engineer at A. W. Chesterton, Boston Scientific, and Procter & Gamble.

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Micah Lande South Dakota School of Mines & Technology

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Micah Lande, Ph.D. is an Assistant Professor and E.R. Stensaas Chair for Engineering Education in the Department of Mechanical Engineering at the South Dakota School of Mines & Technology. He teaches human-centered engineering design, design thinking, and design innovation courses. Dr. Lande researches how technical and non-technical people learn and apply design thinking and making processes to their work. He is interested in the intersection of designerly epistemic identities and vocational pathways. Dr. Lande received his B.S. in Engineering (Product Design), M.A. in Education (Learning, Design and Technology) and Ph.D. in Mechanical Engineering (Design Education) from Stanford University. He was previously an Assistant Professor in the Engineering and Manufacturing Engineering programs and Tooker Professor for Effective STEM Education at the Polytechnic School in the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering at Arizona State University.

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Ann F. McKenna Arizona State University, Polytechnic campus

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Ann F. McKenna is a Professor in the Ira A. Fulton Schools of Engineering and Director of The Polytechnic School at Arizona State University. Prior to joining ASU she served as a program director at the National Science Foundation in the Division of Undergraduate Education, and was on the faculty in the Department of Mechanical Engineering and Segal Design Institute at Northwestern University. Dr. McKenna received her B.S. and M.S. degrees in Mechanical Engineering from Drexel University and Ph.D. from the University of California at Berkeley.

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Abstract

This paper reports on the creation of a canvas tool to promote and sustain faculty teaching innovations. The tool is being developed as part of a research project that is funded by the NSF “Revolutionizing Engineering and Computer Science Departments” (RED) program. The project has an overall aim to propagate a culture of pedagogical risk-taking and realize an additive innovation mindset to promote sharing among engineering faculty at a large, southwestern public university. A specific sub-goal is to understand how faculty development programs and initiatives can influence faculty teaching practices using a modified version of the Business Model Canvas (BMC). The BMC is an organizational tool for capturing and communicating the critical elements of an entrepreneurial-focused ecosystem. It is used to identify the necessary infrastructure that would support a new venture, with a focus on specifying the value propositions for specific customer segments. The local RED project has adapted the BMC to determine the educational ecosystem that would assist, motivate, and engage faculty in pedagogical risk-taking. In our case, the customer segments are engineering faculty, and the value propositions emanate from their stated goals. The adapted canvas documents administrative policies, structures, and other motivators that make a sustained and scalable culture of faculty pedagogical risk-taking possible.

The research team’s adaptation of the BMC was informed by a retrospective analysis of a faculty intervention piloted by the local RED project. Faculty were provided a forum to self-form working groups around areas of shared interest in the undergraduate engineering program. Groups met and worked throughout the 2016-2017, and in some cases, the 2017-2018 academic year, with support provided by the RED project in the form of funding, recognition, and time during faculty meetings to share updates and work in their teams. Four groups emerged, including one focused on enhancing student learning in math-intensive courses and another on aligning student outcomes across the program’s design project spine. In fall 2018, the research team interviewed seven faculty members from these two groups about their reasons for participating and their experiences as members. Each interview was approximately 45 minutes long, conducted in-person, recorded, and transcribed. The interviews were analyzed using a priori codes corresponding to faculty members’ motivations and desired impact, as well as the key partners, resources, and activities that faculty identified for their change effort. Group accounts were constructed from the interviews and used to create a common “Faculty Innovation Canvas” template. Comparison of the two groups using the template showed that even when faculty interest is high, differences in composition and needs may lead to differences in group functionality. For example, the presence or absence of a clear goal and champion may help to explain why one group was more participatory than the other. Individual faculty members’ level of experience with utilizing internal or external resources appeared to impact group progress as well. Further conclusions from the canvas adaptation process will be shared in the full paper. Lessons learned about how to affect real and substantive faculty-initiated change will also be discussed.

Citation
Format

Abhyankar, R. N., & Brunhaver, S. R., & Lande, M., & McKenna, A. F. (2019, June), Board 1: In the Business of Innovation: Development of a Canvas Tool to Promote and Sustain Pedagogical Risk Taking by Faculty Paper presented at 2019 ASEE Annual Conference & Exposition , Tampa, Florida. 10.18260/1-2--32160

TY - CPAPER
AB - This paper reports on the creation of a canvas tool to promote and sustain faculty teaching innovations. The tool is being developed as part of a research project that is funded by the NSF “Revolutionizing Engineering and Computer Science Departments” (RED) program. The project has an overall aim to propagate a culture of pedagogical risk-taking and realize an additive innovation mindset to promote sharing among engineering faculty at a large, southwestern public university. A specific sub-goal is to understand how faculty development programs and initiatives can influence faculty teaching practices using a modified version of the Business Model Canvas (BMC). The BMC is an organizational tool for capturing and communicating the critical elements of an entrepreneurial-focused ecosystem. It is used to identify the necessary infrastructure that would support a new venture, with a focus on specifying the value propositions for specific customer segments. The local RED project has adapted the BMC to determine the educational ecosystem that would assist, motivate, and engage faculty in pedagogical risk-taking. In our case, the customer segments are engineering faculty, and the value propositions emanate from their stated goals. The adapted canvas documents administrative policies, structures, and other motivators that make a sustained and scalable culture of faculty pedagogical risk-taking possible.

The research team’s adaptation of the BMC was informed by a retrospective analysis of a faculty intervention piloted by the local RED project. Faculty were provided a forum to self-form working groups around areas of shared interest in the undergraduate engineering program. Groups met and worked throughout the 2016-2017, and in some cases, the 2017-2018 academic year, with support provided by the RED project in the form of funding, recognition, and time during faculty meetings to share updates and work in their teams. Four groups emerged, including one focused on enhancing student learning in math-intensive courses and another on aligning student outcomes across the program’s design project spine. In fall 2018, the research team interviewed seven faculty members from these two groups about their reasons for participating and their experiences as members. Each interview was approximately 45 minutes long, conducted in-person, recorded, and transcribed. The interviews were analyzed using a priori codes corresponding to faculty members’ motivations and desired impact, as well as the key partners, resources, and activities that faculty identified for their change effort. Group accounts were constructed from the interviews and used to create a common “Faculty Innovation Canvas” template. Comparison of the two groups using the template showed that even when faculty interest is high, differences in composition and needs may lead to differences in group functionality. For example, the presence or absence of a clear goal and champion may help to explain why one group was more participatory than the other. Individual faculty members’ level of experience with utilizing internal or external resources appeared to impact group progress as well. Further conclusions from the canvas adaptation process will be shared in the full paper. Lessons learned about how to affect real and substantive faculty-initiated change will also be discussed.

AU - Rohini N. Abhyankar
AU - Samantha Ruth Brunhaver
AU - Micah Lande
AU - Ann F. McKenna
CY - Tampa, Florida
DA - 2019/06/15
PB - ASEE Conferences
TI - Board 1: In the Business of Innovation: Development of a Canvas Tool to Promote and Sustain Pedagogical Risk Taking by Faculty
UR - https://peer.asee.org/32160
DO - 10.18260/1-2--32160
ER -