Accelerating Careers With Learning Partners
It’s an exciting time to be an educator -if you embrace innovation. Because the future of learning for career development is exploding in all directions. New remote, asynchronous and hybrid options aren’t the only areas where education is innovating. In some courses of study, the apprenticeship model is being redesigned to embrace other creative ways to teach skills while giving students opportunities to practice what they learn, providing them with a degree and work experience at the same time. There are a lot of ways to deliver experiential learning: internships, externships, co-op programs and capstone projects are a few.
I’m going to focus on the capstone class and what I’ve learned from the experience as a professor who teaches and mentors students to highlight makes it different from traditional learning is the inclusion of a third party: the sponsor or client whose problem the students seek to solve by applying the knowledge they are gaining while in school.
Unlike traditional learning between a student and a teacher, experiential learning is a more complicated balance of student, teacher and client. The client is typically a business, government or non-governmental enterprise. Th client could also be an academic institution or researcher. But without this third party, team learning comes close, but without the complexity and richness of learning that can happen when a team of students has the opportunity to combine academic learning with the application of knowledge and skills to solve real-world problems.
Schools that want their students to graduate with this depth of knowledge (and the benefits of professional connections) must approach this unique experience with respect for the complex and nuanced needs and assets that each stakeholder brings to the table.
Having taught graduate student capstone classes at three schools in addition to a 20-year career as a strategy consultant to government, nonprofit, for profit and social enterprises, I’d like to suggest how to do experiential learning well. I share critical factors to consider so the experience is worthwhile for students, clients and faculty.
A successful experience for all stakeholders depends on three things:
Rule #1: Students with a firm grounding in required academic knowledge.
Schools requiring students to pass a capstone class in order to graduate, must support acquisition of foundational knowledge. If a project requires writing and presenting reports in English, students should have age-appropriate language skills. Weak communication skills between students and clients and lesson or assignment comprehension can jeopardize a project from the beginning. Likewise, if the learning project requires a foundation in collecting and analyzing data or college statistics that students are lacking, the project will be running on three wheels when it requires four.
Rule #2: Faculty with domain expertise, technical skills related to the project and a passion for teaching.
Experiential learning classes are atypical of traditional learning. There’s no standard exam to assess what knowledge is acquired or how much effort is made by the individual student. It’s messy and complicated. Students are given a project and are expected to figure out the approach while navigating complex relationships within the team, their sponsor and faculty. Capstone programs use school faculty to fulfill multiple roles (which are often vaguely bounded). Faculty may be expected to teach lessons in topics such as research methods, project management, team building, and presentation skills. While coaching teams on their progress, monitoring individual students’ participation, and playing intermediary with sponsors when students need it. This is in addition to defining and grading assignments, providing office hours and attending faculty meetings. It’s never a class that gets repeated because every semester the expectations change. Experiential learning requires flexibility and a love of teaching.
Rule # 3: Capable sponsors who bring projects with challenging but well- defined problems to be solved.
There is no shortage of potential clients and problems that could benefit from a group of smart, dedicated students excited to put their skills to use and impress potential employers. The key is conducting due diligence to assess whether or not client and project meet the criteria established by the school. Is there clear criteria for selection? Is it applied consistently to all prospective client projects? Do the clients and projects support the strategic goals the school has set (go back to rule #1).
In short, a successful learning experience that brings together students, teachers and industry experts should aim for the following goals each year:
Supporting students to produce quality deliverables and gain knowledge and experience that leads to meaningful outcomes
Hiring qualified faculty who and provide valuable mentoring/learning and networking experiences
Finding and keeping qualified sponsors who bring strong projects and come back as satisfied clients
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Why I’m qualified to advise on experiential learning:
• I’ve taught graduate capstones in three schools over the course of six years at: Columbia University, SIPA; NYU Wagner Graduate School of Public Service; and NYU Tandon-CUSP and have solicited and vetted project partners, and have taught and evaluated students in consulting and project management skills; and coached teams and individual students on consulting-based experiential learning projects.
• I’ve spent 20 years as a professional management and strategy consultant, advising clients on planning for change, while leading business development, sales, staff hiring, training and management, finance and project management
• My clients include government, nonprofit, for profit and social enterprises