The Integrated First-Year Engineering Experience
Lessons in Change
Purdue University
5 April 2001
Dr. Karan L. Watson
(in collaboration with Jeff Froyd)
Funded in part by the National Science Foundation through the
Foundation Coalition
Presentation
• Case Study- TAMU’s Integrated First-year
• Ideas about change- How should we model
the process of change
• Major components of the Change Model
• Discussion
Texas A&M University
CURRICULUM INTEGRATION
changed first- and second-year engineering, math,
physics and chemistry for all students (6
coordinators)
upper-division changes in CVEN, PETE, INEN,
AERO, MEEN
TEAMING & ACTIVE LEARNING
faculty workshops, student profiles, industry diversity
training
TECHNOLOGY ENABLED ROOMS
13 redesigned classrooms
Texas A&M University
INCLUSIVE LEARNING
COMMUNITIES
Clusters- 70% first-year students & 25% secondyear students, 94 faculty members
Industry case studies with all first-year students
Group Study Workshops
ASSESSMENT & EVALUATION
New professional staff, focus on faculty needs in
course revisions
Texas A&M University
Performance Benefit: Grades & Standardized Tests
When compared to equivalent students in traditional
engineering programs, after one year, students in the
new curriculum perform better on standardized tests
and better in grades for follow on courses.
Test
% Gain Greater
than Traditional
16%
Standardized Critical Thinking
Force Concept Inventory
15%
10%
Mechanics Baseline Test
Calculus Concept Test
10%
0
5
10
15
20
W
W hite
hi
te M a
Af Fe le
s
Af r.-A ma
r.- m le
Am . M s
. F ale
La em s
La tino ale
tin M s
a
a
Fe les
O m
t
O her ale
s
th
er Ma
Fe les
m
al
es
% Retained in Engineering
Texas A&M University
FOCUS ON UNDER-REPRESENTED GROUPS
Better retention
100%
90%
80%
70%
60%
50%
40%
30%
20%
10%
0%
Traditional
FC
TAMU Integrated First-Year Curriculum
Concerns
 Pilot section size
 1994-95 Pilot: 50 students per section
 1995-96 Pilot: 100 students per section
 Dividing four hours of PHYS 218 (Mechanics) across two
semesters was not a good idea. Students seemed to pay more
attention to the MATH 151 course (a four-hour course).
 1994-95 Pilot
 PHYS218 (Mechanics) across two semesters
 1995-96 Pilot:
 PHYS218 (Mechanics), Fall Semester (3 credits instead of 4)
 PHYS 208 (E&M), Spring Semester (3 credits instead of 4)
 Overloading students
 Physics laboratories were done in-class using a “studio-like”
approach. $$$$$
TAMU Integrated First-Year Curriculum
Concerns
 Flexibility
 The availability of opportunities to students to “leave” the
integrated curriculum without major penalties. An intervention
program was offered to students who were failing in some of the
subjects [9] but the cost and energy required to run this program
was also questioned.
 The lack of participation by the pre-calculus, honor students, and
students who placed out of courses in the integrated program.
 Faculty and administrators were very concerned about the
“platform independence” of the piloted program. Could
only those “zealots” teach it?
 How will engineering faculty be selected for participation?
 Chemical Engineering Department was concerned about
the one-semester chemistry course
TAMU Integrated First-Year Curriculum
Visualization of Momentum
1993
1995
1997
1999
NSF Funding
Larger pilot
Decide
1994
1996
1998
Formed Team
Stable Team
Form
Eval
Tm.
Large Team
Init. Planning Implementation Pos. Results Chng Team New pilot
Little new
Excited Team
Initial Planning
Initial Results
Excited Students
Nothing’s Wrong Nothing’s Wrong
Personalities
Mom. To Change
Personalities
Workshops to Address Fears
Nothing’s
New
Res. To Change
Negative Anecdotes
Personalities
Poor Teaming
Poor Advising Interface
Emphasizing Values
Negative Anecdotes
Nothing’s Wrong
Personalities
Poor Advising Interface
NSF Funding
Nothing’s Wrong
Personalities
TAMU Integrated First-Year Curriculum
Numerous Integrated Models to Serve
Students
Number of Entering Freshmen in Block Type
Total Number of Incoming Students to First-Year Courses/Year
2060
2000
1600
1570
1520
1480
1420
1995
1996
1997
Pre-Calc
AP Calc
Honors
No Phys Int
No Engl Int
Int Precalc
Full Int Calc
1200
800
400
0
1994
1998
Numerous Integrated Models to Serve Students
500
PRECALC
1000
CALCULUS 1
300
BEYOND
CALCULUS 1
Precalc, Chem, Engr 0
( 300 )
Independent Courses
( 200 )
Calc 1, Phys 1, Engr 1,
Engl 1 ( 100 )
Calc 2, Phys 2, Engr 2,
Chem ( 300 )
Calc 1, Phys 1, Engr 1
( 600 )
Calc 2, Phys 2, Engr 2
( 200 )
Calc 1, Engr 1
( 150 )
Calc 2, Engr 2, Chem
( 300 )
Independent Courses
( 150 )
Independent Courses
( 300 )
Calc 2, Engr 1
( 50 )
Independent Courses
( 250 )
Clusters are
offered to
students at each
level.
Lessons from Foundation Coalition
Curriculum Change Experiences
• Focus on faculty behavior, not the curriculum or technology.
• People outside the pilot groups need to be engaged from the
beginning.
• Assessment data is necessary but not sufficient.
• Successful change requires energy and time.
• Don’t become surprised or defensive when resistance
appears.
• Persevere through turmoil.
• Zealous change champions cannot institutionalize the change
by themselves.
• Articulate an explicit process for the change.
Change - What is it?
Reasons to Change
• Anxiety 1: Fear of learning something new; fear
of changing, based on fear of the unknown.
• Anxiety 2: Fear that if I don’t change and learn
how to learn, things will go badly for me.
• Proposition 1 About Learning
Anxiety 2 must be greater than Anxiety 1.
Schein, Edgar H., Organizational and Managerial Culture
Change - What is it?
Change: Ignorance to Action
• Change occurs in stages
• If you want to facilitate change, then you
need to facilitate movement from one stage
to the next. Don’t expect a person to
change all at once.
• Different people understand different things
about change
Change: Ignorance to Action
Ignorance
Passive Information Gathering
Awareness
Interest
Decision
Active Information Gathering
Commitment
Action
Individual’s Approach to Change
Energy for the Job
Betrayal
Search for Solution
Denial
Crisis
Time
Group’s Approach to Change
Search for
Solutions
Identity
Crisis
Denial
Betrayal
TIME
Concepts in Organizational Change
Nature of Change
Nature of Resistance
Organizational
Culture
Leadership
Change Dynamics
Nature of Change
• Who has to change?
–
–
–
–
Behavior
Attitude
Belief
Value
• What is the timeline for change?
• What are the available resources to fuel change?
Nature of Change
Profound Change
“... we use the term “profound change” to describe
organizational change that combines shifts in people’s
values, aspirations, and behaviors with “other” shifts to
processes, strategies, practices, and systems.... In profound
change there is learning. The organization doesn’t just do
something new, it builds its capacity for doing things in a
new way--indeed, it builds capacity for ongoing change.... It
is not enough to change strategies, structures, and systems,
unless the thinking that produced those strategies, structures,
and systems also changes.”
Senge, Peter, et. al., The Dance of Change
Nature of Change
Adaptive Learning vs. Generative Learning
• Adaptive Learning (Senge) / Single-Loop Learning (Argyris)
– learning that increases the probability of survival, i.e., coping
or survival learning
– focus: solution to a problem
– e.g., passing a test, problem solving, engineering design
• Generative Learning (Senge) / Double-Loop Learning (Argyris)
– meta-level: learning that enhances my ability to create
– recursive: improving personal algorithms, models, processes
– focus: increased personal capacity
– e.g., reflection, learning to learn, learning to improve
Senge, Peter, The Fifth Discipline
Argyris, Chris, “Teaching Smart People to Learn,” Harvard Business Review
Resistance
• Resistance isn't an indication that something is wrong with
what you are trying to change. It is an indication that
something is happening. It is a good sign! If you treat
everything you see as resistance, you can be wrong. It may
be a lack of understanding of what you are doing as
opposed to not liking what you are doing. The remedies for
each are quite different. You will learn many important
things from resistance, which will make your
implementation planning go a lot smoother.
James Hunt
http://www.top7business.com/archives/management/20000208.html
Jim Hunt, Principal
James W. Hunt & Associates
The "Change II" Management Consulting Firm
Web address: www.jameswhunt.com
Resistance
• Resistance is inevitable, not bad
–
–
–
–
People are at different stages in changing
People move from stage to stage at different rates
People move from stage to stage in response to different stimuli
Resistance is similar to turbulence
• Ignorance facilitates resistance; resistance facilitates ignorance
• Responses to resistance
– Dismissal: “You’re an idiot.”
– Bulldozer: “You just don’t understand and I will try again to convince
you of the correctness of my approach.”
– Let’s talk: “What you say has merit. Let me understand your concerns
and let’s review how an alternate proposal might address your concerns.”
– Anticipate: Don’t be placed in a position of selling a curriculum
proposal; instead position yourself as responding to a felt need
Resistance
How to Recognize Resistance
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
•
Confusion
Immediate Criticism
Denial
Malicious Compliance
Sabotage
Easy Agreement
Deflection (changing the subject)
Silence
In-Your-Face Criticism
Maurer, Rick, Beyond the Wall of Resistance, Austin, Texas: Bard Press, 1996, chapter 2
How Intense is the Resistance
• Level 1: The Idea Itself (primarily intellectual)
– Communicating the Idea
-- Relative Advantage
-- Simplicity
-- Compatibility
-- Easy to Test
– Involvement
• Level 2: Deeper Issues (primarily emotional)
– Listen for and address: Distrust, Bureaucratic Culture, Punishments
and Rewards, Loss of Respect and Face, Fear of Isolation, Events in
the World
• Level 3: Deeply Embedded (viewed as enemy)
– Pay attention and attend to issues around
--Historic Animosity
-- Conflicting Values and Vision
Maurer, Rick, Beyond the Wall of Resistance, Austin, Texas: Bard Press, 1996, chapter 8
Response to Resistance
What is your contribution to resistance?
• “Everyone thinks of changing the world, but
no one thinks of changing himself”
Tolstoy
• “We have met the enemy, and he is us”
Pogo
• “We must become the change we wish to
see in the world.”
Gandhi
Response to Resistance
Touchstones in responding to resistance
•
TOUCHSTONE NO. 1: Maintain clear focus
–
–
•
•
TOUCHSTONE NO. 2: Embrace resistance
TOUCHSTONE NO. 3: Respect those who resist
–
–
–
–
•
Struggle for respect
Respect vs. trust
Listen with interest
Tell the truth
TOUCHSTONE NO. 4: Relax
–
–
•
Keep both long and short view
Persevere
Stay calm to stay engaged
Know their intentions
TOUCHSTONE NO. 5: Join with the Resistance
–
–
–
Begin together
Change the game
Find themes and possibilities
Maurer, Rick, Beyond the Wall of Resistance, Austin, Texas: Bard Press, 1996, chapter 5
Change and Resistance
Commitment to
Change
Concerns, e.g.,
• Fear
• Negative
Assessment
Possibly
Improved
Results
New
Learning
• Zealot
Arrogance
Positive Impact
Negative Impact
What is it?
Culture
“Culture eats change
for breakfast”
James Hunt
http://www.top7business.com/archives/management/20000208.html
Jim Hunt, Principal
James W. Hunt & Associates
The "Change II" Management Consulting Firm
Web address: www.jameswhunt.com
What is it?
Culture
• Culture is the collection of lessons (which become
unwritten assumptions) that a group has learned that have
become applied so often that members of the group no
longer question their correctness or even acknowledge
their existence. “It just the way we do things here.”
Frequently, these lessons were learned during the early
history of the group and were often generated or espoused
by its founder.
– because it happened this way, it did not happen another way
– because it was successful, it must have been the right way to do it
• These lessons are communicated explicitly or implicitly to
new members of the group.
What is it?
Levels of Culture
• Artifacts
– visible organizational structures and process
– easy to observe, difficult to decipher, ambiguous
• Espoused values, rules, behavioral norms
– strategies, goals, espoused rationalizations
– articulated reasons for actions, (theories of action, Argyris)
• Basic underlying assumptions
– unconscious, taken-for-granted beliefs
– theories-in-use (Argyris)
Edgar Schein, Organizational Culture and Leadership, second edition
What is it?
Changing Culture
• “You cannot create a new culture. You can
immerse yourself in studying a culture ... Until
you understand it. Then you can propose new
values, introduce new ways of doing things, and
articulate new governing ideas. Over time, these
actions will set the stage for new behavior. If
people who adopt the new behavior feel that it
helps them ... The organizational culture may
embody a different set of assumptions, and a
different way of looking at things ...”
Edgar Schein, in Senge, Peter, The Dance of Change
Leadership
• “Leadership takes place every day. It
cannot be the responsibility of the few, a
rare event, or a once-in-a-lifetime
opportunity.”
Heifetz, Ronald and Donald Laurie, “The Work of Leadership,” Harvard
Business Review, Jan-Feb 1997
• Leadership is too important to be left in the
hands of the few people near the top of the
organizational hierarchy.
Attributes of Effective Leaders
• Inner drive/energy: necessary to initiate and sustain
leadership of change over extended periods of time.
• Intellectual capacity: necessary to listen to input from
diverse sources and synthesize vision and strategy
• Integrity: necessary to synthesize vision and strategy
that benefits the organization first and the individual
second
• Mental/emotion health: necessary for self-confidence
and interpersonal skills
Kotter, John P., A Force for Change: How Leadership Differs From Management, New York:
The Free Press, 1990
Leadership for Change
• Change is hard work.
• Leadership begins with
values
• Intellectual leads physical
• Real changes takes real
change
• Leadership is a team sport
• Expect to be surprised
• Today competes with
tomorrow
• Better is better
• Focus on the future
• Learning from doing
• Grow people
• Reflect
Sullivan and Harper, Hope is not a Method
Leadership for Change
• “Get on the balcony”, get perspective
• Identify the adaptive challenge
• Regulate distress: not too high, not too low
• Maintain disciplined attention
• Give the work back to people
• Protect voices of leadership from below
Heifetz, Ronald and Donald Laurie, “The Work of Leadership,” Harvard Business Review, Jan-Feb 1997
Dynamics of Change Process
• Unfreeze the system
– Is the organization ready
– Have you addressed concerns to get started
• Institute a change
– Recognize nature of change, resistance, culture
– Target who will change and how to diffuse
• Stabilize (refreeze) the system
Change Dynamics
Change Ready Zone
Kriegel & Brandt
“Sacred Cows Make
the Best Burgers”
Challenge
Skill level
req’d.,
Speed of
change,
Effort to
learn
Panic
Zone
Change Ready
Zone
Drone Zone
Competencies, Time, Reserves
Resources
Change Dynamics
Challenges of Initiating
• “We don’t have time!”
– Challenge: control over personal time
• “We have no help!”
– Challenge: inadequate coaching, guidance, and support
• “This stuff isn’t relevant!” “Why?”
– Challenge: relevance
• “They’re not walking the talk!”
– Challenge: management clarity and consistency
Senge, Peter, The Dance of Change
Change Dynamics
Challenges of Sustaining Transformation
• “This stuff is ____!”
– Challenge: fear and anxiety
• “This stuff isn’t working!”
– Challenge: negative assessment of progress
• “We have the right way!” / “They don’t
understand us!”
– Challenge: isolation and arrogance, true believers
and non-believers
Senge, Peter, The Dance of Change
Change Dynamics
Challenges of Redesigning and Rethinking
• “Who’s in charge of this stuff?”
– Challenge: prevailing governance structure
• “We keep reinventing the wheel!”
– Challenge: diffusion, inability to transfer
knowledge
• “Where are we going?”
– Challenge: organization strategy and purpose
Senge, Peter, The Dance of Change
Change Dynamics
Type and Distribution of Adopters
Early
Majority
34%
Early
Adopters
13%
Innovators
3%
Late
Majority
34%
Laggards
16%
Rogers, Everett
M., Diffusion of
Innovations,
fourth edition
Change Dynamics
•
Diffusion
of
Innovation:
Patterns
Innovators
– Venturesomeness; more cosmopolite social relationships; innovators play
gatekeeping role in the flow of new ideas into a system
• Early adopters
– More integrated into local system than innovators; innovators are cosmopolites, early
adopters are localites; greatest degree of opinion leadership
• Early majority
– Interact frequently with peers; seldom hold positions of opinion leadership; unique
position makes them an important link in the diffusion process; may deliberate for
some time before completely adopting a new idea
• Late majority
– Adoption may be result of increasing network peer pressure; weight of system norms
must definitely favor an innovation to help convince late majority
• Laggards
– Most local outlook; many are near isolates; point of reference for the laggard is the
past; decisions often based on what has been done previously
Change Dynamics
Change Reinforcing Processes
Willingness to
Commit to Change
Growing
Network of
Colleagues
Possibly Improved Results
• Personal Results
• Organizational Results
Investment in
Change Initiative
New Learning