A school is “a building that has four walls…with tomorrow inside”: Toward the reinvention of the business school

Business schools, defined as educational institutions that specialize in teaching courses and programs related to business and/or management, are facing major challenges. These challenges stem from a number of major shifts in the business education landscape, including the rising importance of rankings and accreditations, the increased weight placed on ethical decision making, the ongoing debate on rigor vs. relevance in research, the digital revolution, and the significant decrease in public funding. In fact, they are so fundamental that the coming decade is likely to represent a new era in the history of business education, the fourth since the concept of the business school was created in 1819 with the establishment of ESCP Europe. The purpose of this article is to outline these main changes (TASK: T—from tower to Twittersphere, A—from auditorium to anti-café, S—from stakeholder to shareholder, K—from knowledge to know-how) and to discuss how they impact the different AS-SE-TS of a business school (alumni & students, staff & equipment, teachers & scholars). The article ends with a proposed classification of schools along four corners (culture, compass, capital, and content) and a discussion of which types of schools are best suited to adapt to these changes.     

Captivate: Building blocks for implementing active learning

In this study, the authors propose a set of key elements that impact the success of an active learning implementation: content delivery, active learning methods, physical environment, technology enhancement, incentive alignment, and educator investment. Through a range of metrics the authors present preliminary evidence that students in courses implementing these elements learn more while exerting similar effort, demonstrate greater understanding of course content, and establish closer connections with fellow students as well as instructors.     

Developing a Learning Community Approach to Business Ethics Education

In this paper we discuss a project, still in progress, that moves away from a traditional lecture based educational pedagogy. We present a team taught approach to ethics teaching that embraces a progressive philosophy of education and is focused on the development of a discussion based learning community. We describe our primary pedagogical tools of case discussion and the development of student expert role assignments as a locus, and how they relate to the learning community, course content and course objectives. Finally, we provide our preliminary review of outcomes and emerging issues.     

Linking Community and Classroom in Higher Education: Service-Learning and Student Empowerment

ABSTRACT

In this article, service learning is viewed as a means to better prepare students for the realities of work life. Service learning is a way in which abstract concepts can be applied in a real world setting to improve student learning.     

Diversity goals: Reframing the debate and enabling a fair evaluation

While diversity has enjoyed significant popularity in the corporate world for the last two decades, researchers continue to put forward conflicting results regarding the business benefits of workplace diversity. Some say workplace diversity is good for businesses; others argue it is an undertaking full of challenges; and yet others assert that it doesn’t really matter. With this in mind, we attempted to synthesize the research that evaluates the impact of workplace diversity on the organizational bottom line. We find an over-emphasis on demonstrating the business case of diversity in economic denominations, which—to some extent—has limited our understanding of the complex dynamics associated with diversity. We identify a lack of attention toward institutional forces as one of the reasons that has restricted our focus on mere economic gains. Overall, we recommend broadening our definition of goals that organizations have when adopting diversity initiatives by including ‘gain of legitimacy’ and ‘creation of goodwill’ as part of the essential consequences of diversity programs.     

Reorienting consumer education using social learning theory: sustainable development via authentic consumer pedagogy

The paper illustrates the growing interest in understanding consumer behaviour through a social learning theory (SLT) lens, and explains the recently launched United Nations Decade for Education for Sustainable Development (ESD). Then, the discussion turns to an overview of a recently developed ESD/SLT integrated theoretical framework, which is then applied to consumer education via an authentic pedagogy. The paper highlights the rich potential of authentic intellectual work in the form of observational learning by augmenting ESD within authentic consumer education curricula.