Introduction
Bay Crest University (BCU) is seeking a solution to enhance the first-year experience for incoming undergraduate students. Based on recent surveys, first-year students were increasingly feeling “overwhelmed,” and the student emotional health ratings were at their lowest levels. Current students were reportedly spending more hours each week partying than studying. First-year students were increasingly preoccupied with decisions about selecting a major and focusing as quickly as possible on a career specialty.
Background Information
As explained in The ID Casebook: Case Studies in Instructional Design (2013) “First-year Working Group” made up of six key Student Affairs staff and 20 volunteer faculty as well as the associate deans from each of the three undergraduate colleges were unable to reach an agreement in recent semesters. Provost Callahan has requested innovative and creative solutions going forward.
Provost Callahan has approved additional time. Additional time is necessary to build a program that the larger campus community would see as having added value for incoming students. BCU needs to do a lot more work garnering buy-in from the faculty in all three undergraduate colleges before we can have a successful pilot. Also, BCU needs a shared set of competencies established on campus. Lastly, BCU needs to complete student writing initiatives established on campus.
Provost Callahan, Client
Melanie Williams, Project Manager
Mark Jones, Co- Project Lead
Sue Gulick, Co- Project Lead
Associate Deans
Peggy Smith, Arts and Sciences
Hank Levitt, Business
Eli Strauss, Engineering
BCU goals are to enhance the first-year experience for incoming undergraduate students by providing a shared experience that combines both curricular topics and co-curricular topics within the context of an interdisciplinary or theme-oriented academic course. Curricular topics include writing, critical thinking, and information literacy. Co-curricular topics such as planning and preparation, multicultural awareness, leadership, civic responsibility, and wellness/ healthy choices.
What contributed to the project’s success or failure?
The teacher's inability to cooperate with the project leaders to develop a curriculum to enhance first-year student experiences and increase the retention rate.
Which parts of the PM process, if included, would have made the project more successful? Why?
The project management process benefits most when the team spends adequate time in the initial phases of planning. In an Chron. article, Smith states, "The planning phase is the most important; time and effort invested in this phase lays a solid foundation for the project. This phase identifies and defines the project's costs, scope, risks, opportunities and constraints. Appropriate stakeholders should be involved in the planning phase to provide feedback."
Resources:
Ertmer, P. 2013. The ID Casebook : Case Studies in Instructional Design 4th. Mark Jones and Sue Gulick: Meeting Challenges in the Design and Delivery of a University-wide First Year Experience Course
Smith, E. n.d. Phases of Project Life Cycles. Chron. https://smallbusiness.chron.com/tasks-five-phases-project-management-52690.html
Mel,
ReplyDeleteFlexibility for the win! While it would seem that effective project managers attempt to consider and mitigate all possible risks. the realities of life makes it impossible to prepare for every contingency. Senapathy (2022) states, “Change is the only constant a project manager builds change, unforeseen differences, and difficulties into every project.” (para. 4). Your ability to resolve the unexpected issue to succeed and "save the day". Being flexible and proactive in the approach to a project allows a PM to be fluid in addressing change as it occurs (Senapathy, 2022).
Reference
Senapathy, Y. (2022, April 6). Project Management and change - the fine art of flexibility. Project Management Training Institute. Retrieved July 17, 2022, from https://www.4pmti.com/learn/project-management-flexibility-change/
Mel blog Response.
ReplyDeleteAn Internet connection failure can be catastrophic to a project, creating a big challenge to the running of It all. The truth is, we all have experienced a lot of frustrations of either poor Internet connectivity or nonexistent internet connectivity and the impact It has got on a project running, as you have greatly said backup options would always be needed, although the stability of internet connectivity on whole has improved, one thing that can be said is that no connection is guaranteed, there a back is always necessary.
Thank you for sharing.