From the high tech sector to higher education, one leadership challenge is similar: how do you nurture a culture of innovation in a hierarchical environment? It’s probably tougher in the public sector, and especially in centuries-old academic institutions with bicameral, colleagial decision-making processes. But even entrepreneurial firms like Google or Adobe had to wrestle with similar challenges as they grew into tech giants. This week, Ken Steele continues his conversation with Jason Dewling, the president of LaSalle College Vancouver, who offers 5 ways that campus leaders can help encourage a culture of innovation.

1) Increase Risk Tolerance

To have the best ideas, you have to have a lot of ideas, which means some of them won’t work. More innovative higher ed institutions will increase their tolerance for risk, allow people to pioneer ideas, experiment, and accept that some future tweaking will be required.

2) Let the Best Ideas Win

Cultivate your people according to their talents and strengths, and allow open debate and experiment to let the best ideas win.

3) Get Beyond Silos

Develop cross-functional teams so people can learn from diverse perspectives and fresh ideas.

4) Seek Talent Beyond PSE

Leaders need to be deliberate in talent acquisition and development. Instead of rewarding seniority and promoting from within, Jason believes higher ed will be increasingly hiring from other sectors (other sectors of higher ed, but also the private sector) in academic and non-academic areas. (Janet Morrison is a good example, a former VP at York University who was recently hired as president of Sheridan College. We’ll share our interview with her in an upcoming episode. So you don’t miss it, be sure to subscribe! http://eduvation.ca/subscribe/ )

Jason’s own background includes almost 2 decades of experience at public colleges in Alberta. He observes that the LCI Education Network includes 23 private for-profit institutions around the world, but it grew from the foundation of LaSalle College Montreal, part of the public PSE system in Quebec.

5) Structure for Flexibility

LaSalle’s unique advantage frees it from historical structures that traditionally slow down progress in higher ed, so they can be much more responsive and market-driven. Like industry in all sectors, higher ed institutions need to be change-ready and adaptable.

Dr. Jason Dewling was appointed President of LaSalle College Vancouver in August 2017. Prior to that, he had 17 years of experience at public colleges in Alberta, as VP Academic and Research at Olds College, Associate Dean and Instructor at Olds College. Jason holds an M.Div from Acadia University, and a PhD in Education from the University of Alberta.

Special thanks to the LaSalle College Vancouver Media Arts students and staff, who stayed late to help make us look and sound professional!

If you would like to host an onsite episode of Ten with Ken, see http://eduvation.ca/twk/site-visits/ for more information.

In the face of mounting budgetary pressure, colleges and universities are finding new collaborative approaches to achieve efficiency and economies of scale. Public institutions are sharing campuses and facilities, forming regional marketing groups, and even signing agreements to share course sections between different institutions using distance delivery.  Some smaller colleges, particularly in the US, are merging with larger competitors, or finding financial strength in numbers through collaborative purchasing agencies.  Some are joining global networks to provide corporate training to multinational clients, or share administrative infrastructure.

One such global network is the LCI Education Network, a global group of 24 institutions from Toronto to Melbourne, Barcelona, Morocco and Instanbul. It grew out of LaSalle College in Montreal, part of the public system in Quebec, and now includes some of the world’s leading fashion and design institutes.

This week, Ken Steele chats with the president of LaSalle College Vancouver, Jason Dewling, about the benefits of shared Finance and IT services, amortized across a global network. Global networks give small colleges access to world-class talent and systems, like Ellicom, an online learning team with 80+ experts in augmented and virtual reality. Ellicom produces online training programs for corporate clients including simulations and assessments, and LCI institutions can access its team to support online program delivery too.  Looking ahead to the future of education, Jason emphasizes that we will need to find meaningful ways to integrate technology while retaining the fundamentally social nature of learning.

Dr. Jason Dewling was appointed President of LaSalle College Vancouver in August 2017.  Prior to that, he had 17 years of experience at public colleges in Alberta, as VP Academic and Research at Olds College, Associate Dean and Instructor at Olds College. Jason holds an M.Div from Acadia University, and a PhD in Education from the University of Alberta.

Next week, our conversation with Jason continues as he shares 5 ways higher ed leaders can help nurture a culture of innovation, and ensure that “the best ideas win.”  So you don’t miss it, be sure to subscribe! http://eduvation.ca/subscribe/

Special thanks to the LaSalle College Vancouver Media Arts students and staff, who stayed late to help make us look and sound professional!

If you would like to host an onsite episode of Ten with Ken, see http://eduvation.ca/twk/site-visits/for more information.

Faced with tuition caps and declining government grants, public colleges and universities are becoming more entrepreneurial and seeking alternative revenue streams, often by selling off surplus campus lands to developers, or leasing campus space for retail or residential development. Simon Fraser University, built in a conservation area atop Burnaby Mountain just a 30-minute drive from downtown Vancouver, took its unique geographic opportunity and turned it into an exercise in city-building, literally “moving mountains” to establish a complete, walkable and almost self-sufficient town adjacent to its campus.

In previous visits to campus, we learned about SFU’s community engagement strategy (https://youtu.be/EGWvfBqJEGs ) and the many ways in which the University uses its campuses in Vancouver, Surrey and Burnaby to build communities (https://youtu.be/dujezn6_afg ). This week, Ken Steele talks with SFU president Andrew Petter, and SFU Community Trust CEO Gordon Harris, about “UniverCity,” a development that is creating affordable housing for 10,000 people, adding two dozen shops and services for the campus community, generating a $90-million endowment for the institution, and exploring new frontiers in environmental and economic sustainability.

Built “in splendid isolation” atop Burnaby Mountain in 1965, SFU wanted to engage with community – but in this case, had to build its own community from scratch. The University negotiated with the municipality to transfer its zoning density from the entire mountain to a much smaller 65-acre parcel adjacent to campus, and built a suburban community with urban density, largely on lands formerly occupied by student parking lots.  When fully complete, UniverCity will be home to almost 10,000 people, in apartment-style condos and stacked townhomes that meet the most ambitious environmental sustainability goals on the continent. UniverCity has won more than 30 national and international sustainability awards, including for its comprehensive stormwater management system. All developers aim to be 45% more energy efficient and 68% more water efficient than a typical code building, in order to quality for additional density. Many buildings have rainwater harvesting systems, solar arrays or geothermal heating. A new district energy system will use biomass to provide heat and hot water to two dozen buildings, in UniverCity and on the SFU campus. UniverCity’s $3 million Childcare Centre is the “greenest childcare on the planet,” and will soon have earned Living Building Challenge certification as a building that generates more energy than it uses, harvests more water than it uses, and is built from recycled and local materials. (It will be the first in Western Canada.)

UniverCity also strives for economic sustainability, creating affordable housing to help SFU attract faculty, staff, students and their families. (About half of the residents are affiliated with the University, and almost half have young children.) SFU leased some of the land to developers like VanCity at a 30% discount, so that residential units could be sold at a 20% discount in perpetuity (such as the "Verdant" townhomes). Standalone “green mortgages” amortize the cost of environmental upgrades separately from the purchase price of units. As urban planner Harris explains, “if it isn’t economic, it isn’t sustainable.”

UniverCity had to provide more than just housing to its residents: it needed to establish all the infrastructure of a small town, including restaurants, a grocery story, pharmacy, childcare centre, an elementary school, and soon a medical centre.  Residents also have access to campus facilities next door, including fitness and aquatic centres, art gallery, library and bookstore – and in return, the campus community can access shops and services in UniverCity. Someday it may also have an active seniors facility, where alumni and others could move in retirement.

The community has added life and vitality to the SFU campus, as well as $15 million worth of new infrastructure, from a town square to the new heating facility and underground pipelines. Ultimately, the UniverCity endowment will support teaching and research at SFU “for the rest of time.”

Thanks again to Andrew Petter, Gordon Harris, and the SFU videographers who made this episode possible.

To learn more about UniverCity, visit http://univercity.ca, watch this beautiful documentary by France’s EchoLogis https://youtu.be/jDdSaGcQvQw, or read Gordon Harris’ new book, Building Community: Defining, Designing, Developing UniverCityhttps://living-future.org/product/building-community-book/ 

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And if you would like to host a 10K Site Visit at your campus, see http://eduvation.ca/twk/site-visits/ for further information!