Eunice Abaga, Alexandra Blakeney, Samantha Flood,
Erin Inglis, Eleanor Peebles, and Lokman Wong
Introduction (Joanna Sheridan): In March 2024, WINCan’s Dr. Thomas Carey had three guest interactions (virtually) at the University of King’s College to work with students enrolled in a non-credit career development program called Liberal Arts Passport to Innovation. The Passport program is geared towards helping students frame their assets for employers and understand how their liberal arts skills and interests could be a fit with the innovation space. However, it does not teach innovation skills as such. The six student authors listed above were enthusiastic about adding two additional sessions to this co-curicular experience so that they could gain more familiarity with systematic approaches to innovation. A chapter from the WINCan Open Educational Resources (in the eCampus Ontario Open Library) on "Innovation Adaptation” was selected for this purpose and the class then decided to take this WINCan OER resources itself as the Innovation to be considered for adaptation in a pilot project.
Liberal Arts Passport to Innovation is a hybrid program (part online and part on-campus) that consists of six online modules (asynchronous) and six on-campus group coaching sessions of one hour each. This course will be your passport to the changing landscape of work, helping you to chart a course towards your goals, speak the language of this foreign land, and unlock opportunities you didn’t even know existed.
A special emphasis will be placed on the compatibility between a liberal arts education and opportunities in the innovation space. For us, this includes small to medium sized not-for-profits, social enterprises, and businesses that are trying something new and creative and are driven by a desire to make an impact on the world. These enterprises, and business in general, value the “human skills” that a liberal arts education cultivates.
Liberal Arts Passport to Innovation will help make the connection between what you have to offer and what employers need.
That is, they used the systematic approach to innovation adaptation to explore how this particular resource from the WINCan OER could have a place at King’s and, if so, what would have to be adapted to make it a good fit that offers lasting value. In this post, the King’s students listed above share their initial thoughts on how the Inclusive Workplace Innovation theme and resources might fit with the King’s context. (Excerpts from the OER content used in this study are available here: an analysis of the four-step process for “A Systematic Approach to Innovation Adaptation” and an outline of the applied Innovation Adaptation project on “How Might It Work Here?”.)
The results of their work are presented here “as told to” Joanna and Tom. You can learn more about each of the students – and Joanna – in the brief bios at the end of this post.
The King’s B.A. Context
King’s is a small liberal arts and journalism university with a close association to neighbouring Dalhousie University. King’s educational model involves virtually all students beginning with an immersive four-credit Great Books Foundation Year Program in which students trace the development of Western culture from Mesopotamia to the present using only primary texts. Students can then choose one of King’s programs (e.g., interdisciplinary humanities, journalism) or select a degree pathway at Dalhousie. Some of the Foundation Year Program structure follows a Great Books approach similar to Honors Colleges in the U.S.
Excerpts from King’s How the Foundation Year Works
…Most days, you attend morning lectures with the entire first-year class. The lecture is delivered by one of King’s or Dalhousie’s faculty experts, to provide clarity around the day’s reading and explain it’s historical importance.
…In the afternoon, you spend an hour in small discussion groups (called “tutorials”) led by faculty (your “tutors”) with about 15 others to discuss the books you’re reading.
…During the term, you’ll write papers approximately every two weeks. You’ll take oral exams in December and April in which you’ll use your burgeoning oral communication skills to answer questions, and reconstruct, synthesize and assemble an understanding of what you’ve read. …There are no textbooks. You form your own interpretations of classic books aided by faculty experts bringing them to life through lectures and tutorials.
What we learned
1. Does the Innovation Fit (with the organizational context and goals at King’s?
There were strong expressions of the students’ distinctive identity as Liberal Arts students in the King’s context, and resulting uncertainty about how the topic of employee workplace innovation fit with their understanding of that context:
Initially, this sounded more like a topic for a Business course to me. But I can see now how it reframes my conception of innovation.
I don’t see a connection between the approaches we’ve been learning in our King’s courses and the step-by-step approach in the handout.
Only one student mentioned a link to employability for Liberal Arts graduates as a factor in program planning at King’s:
If this has a clear connection to a work placement, then I might want to learn more.
2. Should We Do It Here: What benefits, costs and risks need to be considered?
One student raised the issue of senior student retention in King’s Liberal Arts courses:
Could this help King’s to retain students’ Liberal Arts interests as they approach graduation and entry into the workforce?
Another student saw benefit in exposing King’s students to
This could help us to think more about how to engage users in design of programs and services) and appeal to their interests.
One student suggested a complementary benefit, from Liberal Arts to Innovation concepts:
I think including Liberal Arts perspectives could enhance how we conceive of Innovation. (TC: This line of thought echoes some past WINCan explorations about the distinctive value that Humanities and Social Science perspectives could bring to innovation project teams.)
3. Can We Do It Here: What changes will be needed and how ready are we to tackle them?
Some students pointed out the limitations of the Liberal Arts Passport to Innovation format as a way for students to engage in innovation projects (and possible extensions/alternatives):
This might work better as a special two-day workshop before term starts.
We should think more about how to explicitly include perspectives from the King’s (Humanities) discipline areas. That could help us all to find the ‘sweet spot’ at Kings.
I found a lot of the language being used was unfamiliar to me – maybe more case stories would help as an introduction?
One student pointed out the special needs of King’s international students, who already have to grapple with cultural differences from their home countries:
Perhaps our international students could do some pre-work (about innovation expectations in the Canadian workforce) before exploring their own potential involvement in workplace innovation. (TC: Another of our new partner institutions has raised a similar question regarding international in a quite different context – students in Engineering and Science programs who need help in understanding a requirement in work placement descriptions that employees be ‘innovative’ .)
4. How Would We Do It Here: What small steps can we take to learn more and test ideas?
King’s doesn’t currently have a mechanism for students to act as curriculum intrapreneurs in experimental courses (as in the Ex College at Tufts University) or introducing innovative resources in existing courses. As a starting point, one student suggested a small case study with a workplace innovation project in the Registrar’s office at King’s (where she was working part-time) or with one of the King’s student societies.
Postscript from Tom and Joanna: Perhaps the most interesting result of the pilot study at King’s was a confirmation of the distinctive contexts within each of our institutional partners. Viewed from afar, the King’s students might seem sufficiently similar to Faculty of Arts students elsewhere – at Monash University, the University of Toronto, or the University of Waterloo – to suggest that learning resources and activities developed by those institutions could be easily adapted for use at King’s.
However, by engaging directly with students as they explore the resources and how they relate to the rest of their programs – and their own plans – the picture looks quite different. For B.A. students at Waterloo, for example, Employability is often ‘front-of-mind’; for Monash students, it is a continuing issue in the background. But for King’s B.A. students, Employability does not appear as a primary concern in program planning (except for students in the Journalism program, which is a professional work domain that is also undergoing dramatic change).
Consequently, adaptations of the Job Crafting ePortfolio from Monash or of the University of Toronto’s Workplace Innovation Skills for Employment Success are a less likely fit; on the other hand, an early introduction of Intrapreneurship as a motivational topic at Monash Arts might be more appropriate. King’s might also be fertile ground for introducing Inclusive Innovation as a ‘big picture’ goal and Inclusive Workplace Innovation as a feasible starting point for new graduates.
Authors
Eunice Abaga is studying Journalism at King’s, on leave from her position as a Health Policy Analyst with the Government of Nova Scotia. She holds a Master’s degree in Public Administration (MPA, Dalhousie) and a Master’s in Education (Med, Mount St. Vincent). Alexandra Blakeney recently completed her Foundation Year program at King’s and will be continuing toward a B.A. in Sustainability Studies. Samantha Flood is entering the final year of the B.A. (Hon) program, with a focus on Contemporary Studies, Political Science and Art History and is currently a Public Affairs and Communications Intern with the Compass Rose group. Erin Inglis recently completed her B.A. (Hon) degree at King’s College. Eleanor Peebles is also entering the final year of a B.A. (Hon) program, in History and Early Modern Studies. Lokman Wong recently completed her B.Sc. (Hon) in Psychology at King’s College, during which she also served as a Legislative Page in the Nova Scotia Legislature.
Joanna Sheridan is King’s Manager of Experiential Learning & Public Humanities and Assistant to the Vice-President (currently on Parental Leave). She is a King’s graduate – B.A. (Hon) in Contemporary Studies and History – and also holds Master’s degrees from the University of Toronto (Museum Studies) and the Institute for Christian Studies (Philosophy).
References
Carey, T., Baregheh, A, Nobis, F. and Stevenson, M. (2023). Leveraging a Diverse Collaboration in Tertiary Education to Develop Capability for Workplace Innovation. European Journal of Workplace Innovation 8(1), pp. 105-135.