Explores how, although individual innovations like collaborative learning, service learning, or the use of technology in teaching are finding their way onto some campuses, a holistic approach that looks at teaching and learning strategies from an integrated perspective may offer the greatest impact. (EV)

Discusses how dire, long-term financial pressures for both public and private colleges and universities could lead to a fundamental restructuring of their organizational and learning systems around the most promising innovations in teaching and learning. Offers three organizing principles and seven transformative actions. (EV)

Why is it so hard for colleges and universities to change? Why do even innovative institutions that invest considerable time and effort in attempts to improve performance often fall back into long-established patterns? Why is the whole of educational innovation often less than the sum of the parts? Consider three colleges and universities.…

The Mina Shaughnessy Scholars Program provides funds for innovators in postsecondary education to develop and disseminate their ideas. Its goal is to improve practice, rather than to advance knowledge, and the search is for practitioners who can make the most difference in improving postsecondary education. (MLW)

The most recent educational innovation to capture widespread attention derives from the linking of rapidly maturing informational technologies to the renewed interest in how, when, and why people learn. Technically defined as electronically mediated instruction, but dubbed "e-learning" to mark its place within the larger e-commerce revolution,…

The "Change" undergraduate teaching program identifies and describes some of the best undergraduate teaching now going on in American colleges and universities. The basis for election is a set of carefully developed criteria that define improved teaching in terms of learning goals and outcomes, with special emphasis on the adaptability of the…

George Keller's criticism of the state of higher education research is discussed. An alternative model of the relationship between research and policy, some valuable contributions of higher education research, and steps for improving the quality and impact of that research are described. (MLW)

The key to an American corporate renaissance is the development of "participation management" skills and environments that allow for the full use of ideas that arise from within the corporation itself. Companies must relearn to trust their people and encourage them to use neglected creative capacities. (Author/MLW)

The University of California at Santa Cruz had an innovative curriculum but in 1976 was unable to hold on to its students, and enrollments started to fall. The Santa Cruz experience gives an insight into liberal learning and the impact of professionalization on education today. (MLW)

A distinction between the student movement and the counterculture is made. Many of the educational innovations endorsed by the student movement in the 1960s are seen as having survived while the sociopolitical experimentation promoted by the counterculture has failed. Examples of innovations are provided. (MLW)

The premise of "A Quest for Common Learning," which questioned the value of distribution requirements in 95 percent of U.S. colleges, is challenged. It is suggested that the varied academic disciplines demonstrate the pursuit of truth, and general education must immerse the student in a number of disciplines. (MLW)

Writers and artists near or in retirement need some device for keeping the creative forces alive. A project proposed by William Plater at the University of Illinois calls for a series of contemporary, or living, history courses by emeriti professors whose own contributions may have shaped their fields. (MLW)

Describes how the Fund for the Improvement of Postsecondary Education (FIPSE) has played a central role in sponsoring innovations in the medical and health sciences, including landmark medical projects to integrate women's health issues into the medical curriculum and to use lay people in the teaching and evaluating of medical students. (EV)

During the '40s and '50s, an experiment in general education was conducted at the undergraduate college at the University of Chicago. "The Chicago Plan" included: students would enroll after two years of high school; a strictly prescribed curriculum; an autonomous faculty; and comprehensive exams to assess students' progress. (MLW)

Elderhostels are examined in terms of the circumstances influencing their rise, class participation, kinds of students involved, and factors making the elderhostels an irreversible program. It is suggested that future elderhostels may join national adult education programs, national issues may surface around regional courses, and courses may have…