By J. Cosgrove
Disruptive innovation is a popular topic on many college campuses. The problem is that on too many campuses it seems to be only that—a topic.
Too many colleges view innovative approaches like their mother’s fine china—you know, something to be brought out when special guests (legislators, accrediting bodies, key funders, etc.) come by, but not to be used for everyday students.
Colleges are slow or (dare I say) bad at innovation because they are designed to be bad at innovation. They are organized to do what they do—enroll and instruct traditional students, who are college-ready and have both the time and the energy to attend classes organized around the Carnegie credit hour unit. Community colleges have tried to break from this mode, but their efforts often crash into instructional and faculty compensation models that are designed according to a credit hour production and accumulation model.
An initiative that bears watching is the Community College Transformative Change project. “Its goal is to design and prototype a new model for community college student success in college completion and employment. Funded by The Bill and Melinda Gates Foundation and Lumina Foundation, this exploratory project utilizes the momentum of innovation spurred by the United States Department of Labor Trade Adjustment Assistance Community College Career Training (TAACCCT) grants to support a network of consortia dedicated to advancing transformative change” (source, Office of Community College Research & Leadership, University of Illinois).
Before you think I’m bashing all colleges, I must admit that some are working hard to break down traditional models and their efforts are paying dividends. So what makes innovation work at some colleges and not at others? Size and bureaucratic complexity are often identified as the usual suspects. Although they certainly play a role, colleges that have navigated the treacherous waters of innovation almost always say the same things—“We committed to the innovation, not just the idea” or “We simply outworked the challenges.” Innovation is more than just a good idea. Innovation requires change and change requires a support structure and commitment to start, evaluate, modify, and improve. So if you really want to take on disruptive innovations, I suggest you listen to your students and remember Edison’s advice—“I have not failed. I’ve just found 10,000 ways that won’t work.”