DISCUSS

Building the DISCUSS community

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Expanding the notion of communities of practice | Findings...

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Randolph Discussion commencée par Randolph Il y a 9 ans

Dear all,

last Friday Brian Dillon and I discussed a range of options towards developing our community further. As a result of this discussion, we concluded that complementary to reflection and spreading of project results, we should also have a closer look at the transfer of project outcomes into educational and social practice.

Findings from recent K4 projects show that European projects often start from the implicit assumption that good products and dissemination strategies are decisive for the impact of projects, and once these factors are given they become fast-selling items: "Look what great things we have produced, don’t you want to try them out?”

However, there is little evidence for this really happening. As a matter of fact, the bulk of products developed in European products never makes its way to the world of education and learning, and their "impact" remains limited to a small number of partners or experts associated with the partnership.

The KA4 project Xploit recently has analysed this phenomenon, and found out that the reason for the low impact of European projects in many cases could be explained by the fact that those projects develop educational and social innovations, which however do not find their counterpart on the beneficiaries side.

Beneficiaries, such as local learner communities or educational institutions usually do not have the capacities to identify, critically analyse and develop the mechanisms required to successfully adopt innovations. The Xploit project therefore points to the need for new communities of practice, bringing together a broad range of local stakeholders with a common interest in the exploitation of innovations.

As Brian during our conversation stated, the DISCUSS approach in this respect could be understood in a more broader sense than used so far, as a platform for communities of practice open to all who are concerned with questions on how to put ideas into practice, rather than a community of project actors spreading ideas.

Moreover, Brian points out that "if we accept this, then the range of stakeholders we may need to target can be much broader than those stakeholder in the education, training or LLL sectors. Those are important but so also may be a range of others (for example planners, those involved in local community development, employers, even politicians depending on the place and the circumstances)."

Share your opinion!

Randolph

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Georges van der Straten Dear Randolph and Brian, happy to join your conversation. I hope I can bring my small contribution. You say that « beneficiaries, such as local learner communities or educational institutions usually do not have the capacities to identify, critically analyse and develop the mechanisms required to successfully adopt innovations ». This is right, but our experience shows that knowledge exchange and transfer of innovation should go viral through physical encounters ! We were very surprised by seeing how spontaneously Ecett trainees bring innovations back from their internships abroad. This is a result of the personalized matching between the trainee and the experts but also of the « journeyman learning philosophy». To me, the biggest obstacle for transfer of innovations is bridging the gap between hearing or reading (theoretically) about someone else innovation and being involved in a global and integrated learning situation, which means : I hear, I see, I ask, I hear other colleagues...Dear Randolph and Brian, happy to join your conversation. I hope I can bring my small contribution. You say that « beneficiaries, such as local learner communities or educational institutions usually do not have the capacities to identify, critically analyse and develop the mechanisms required to successfully adopt innovations ». This is right, but our experience shows that knowledge exchange and transfer of innovation should go viral through physical encounters ! We were very surprised by seeing how spontaneously Ecett trainees bring innovations back from their internships abroad. This is a result of the personalized matching between the trainee and the experts but also of the « journeyman learning philosophy». To me, the biggest obstacle for transfer of innovations is bridging the gap between hearing or reading (theoretically) about someone else innovation and being involved in a global and integrated learning situation, which means : I hear, I see, I ask, I hear other colleagues and clients, I ask again, I observe, I eat with them, I speak with my fellow trainees, I debrief, I write, I am accompanied by my help desk, I return the information to my boss and my team, etc. This supposes giving a priority in ones agenda for spending two days with a specific expert because this is how it becomes viral. It requires giving a priority to such learning experience in one’s own agenda among so many other « priorities » and « emergencies ».

A second finding of Ecett is that feedback impact and transfer of innovation are much more powerful if three members of one team participate to one internship of two days in comparison to one staff member leaving for an individual internship of one month ! If three people of the same team have heard and seen and are convinced by an innovation, they have a critical mass when they come back for overcoming the systemic resistance of their own organization.

I think these are two important little steps before « bringing together a broad range of local stakeholders with a common interest in the exploitation of innovations ». After bringing stakeholders together, such short experiences of « two days of global and integrated learning situations » can be made by other stakeholders if required.

Does this make sense for you ?
Afficher plus Il y a 9 ans

Dear Randolph and Brian, happy to join your conversation. I hope I can bring my small contribution. You say that « beneficiaries, such as local learner communities or educational institutions usually do not have the capacities to identify, critically analyse and develop the mechanisms required to successfully adopt innovations ». This is right, but our experience shows that knowledge exchange and transfer of innovation should go viral through physical encounters ! We were very surprised by seeing how spontaneously Ecett trainees bring innovations back from their internships abroad. This is a result of the personalized matching between the trainee and the experts but also of the « journeyman learning philosophy». To me, the biggest obstacle for transfer of innovations is bridging the gap between hearing or reading (theoretically) about someone else innovation and being involved in a global and integrated learning situation, which means : I hear, I see, I ask, I hear other colleagues and clients, I ask again, I observe, I eat with them, I speak with my fellow trainees, I debrief, I write, I am accompanied by my help desk, I return the information to my boss and my team, etc. This supposes giving a priority in ones agenda for spending two days with a specific expert because this is how it becomes viral. It requires giving a priority to such learning experience in one’s own agenda among so many other « priorities » and « emergencies ». A second finding of Ecett is that feedback impact and transfer of innovation are much more powerful if three members of one team participate to one internship of two days in comparison to one staff member leaving for an individual internship of one month ! If three people of the same team have heard and seen and are convinced by an innovation, they have a critical mass when they come back for overcoming the systemic resistance of their own organization. I think these are two important little steps before « bringing together a broad range of local stakeholders with a common interest in the exploitation of innovations ». After bringing stakeholders together, such short experiences of « two days of global and integrated learning situations » can be made by other stakeholders if required. Does this make sense for you ?

Randolph hi George,

thanks for sharing your ideas. I think that everybody can agree, that learning from others' experience in the course of mobility actions can be of great value, and it seems even more promising if we can connect it to existing European traditions like the "journeyman".

However, I also guess that there can be no one-best-strategy to transfer innovations. Education and training are dynamic and open systems. They function in context, such as local traditions, learning cultures, institutional setups and belief systems. Thus, a solution found in one place might remain rather meaningless in another, and innovative solutions might be mainstream elsewhere. At best the effectiveness and impact of a practice can explained by its fitness for purpose, whether this be the achievement of a strategic goal or a solution to a problem, its compliance with the local context, practices and routines in place, and the local conventions determining the “value” of a certain practice.

Taking these... Afficher plus Il y a 9 ans

hi George, thanks for sharing your ideas. I think that everybody can agree, that learning from others' experience in the course of mobility actions can be of great value, and it seems even more promising if we can connect it to existing European traditions like the "journeyman". However, I also guess that there can be no one-best-strategy to transfer innovations. Education and training are dynamic and open systems. They function in context, such as local traditions, learning cultures, institutional setups and belief systems. Thus, a solution found in one place might remain rather meaningless in another, and innovative solutions might be mainstream elsewhere. At best the effectiveness and impact of a practice can explained by its fitness for purpose, whether this be the achievement of a strategic goal or a solution to a problem, its compliance with the local context, practices and routines in place, and the local conventions determining the “value” of a certain practice. Taking these general assumptions as departure point, the most valuable point I see in the concept of learning through mobility is the potential to develop a critical perspective, to reflect own experience in the light of others', to challenge commonly held assumptions and develop a sense for reality. Such a critical perspective then also may inform learning on different levels - from individual to collective - and keep it dynamic. Best Randolph

Georges van der Straten I totally agree, there is no "one way" ! Il y a 9 ans