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Executive Summary: The Strategic Role of a National Organization

This study explored an undergraduate education initiative developed by the Association of American Universities (AAU) to improve the quality of undergraduate teaching and learning in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields at its member institutions. The study relied on interviews, documents, and observations to examine strategies that have been successful in scaling and sustaining changes arising from the AAU STEM Initiative.

The project explored two major questions:

  1. How does the AAU Initiative achieve scale in reform of undergraduate STEM teaching and learning?
  2. What is the role of a national association in undergraduate STEM reform and what approaches are perceived to have the most impact in achieving scale?

Following are the key findings related to these questions:

AAU used a systems approach to promote long-lasting large-scale change in STEM teaching. The systems approach used by AAU included three primary levels: the institutional level, consisting of the Initiative’s eight campus-based project sites; the AAU network level, across the 62 AAU member-universities as a group; and the national level, composed of various national agencies and groups interested in STEM teaching reform. As intended, AAU’s strategic focus on these primary organizational levels, as well as the various subsystems within them, helped foster large-scale commitment to reforming STEM education by its member institutions. 

AAU was most effective when it used strategies that leveraged the prestige of the “AAU identity,” i.e., the most prestigious research university collective in the United States. The three most efficacious strategies were:

  • strategies aimed at utilizing the prestige and influence of AAU
  • strategies that built on the historic strengths of AAU
  • strategies that utilized a unique niche of AAU

When interviewees commented about missed opportunities to improve undergraduate STEM education, they often meant AAU not leveraging its prestige and influence, not working with its historic strengths (such as mobilizing presidents or issuing national reports), and not utilizing its unique niche (e.g. its ability to convene key stakeholders).

These findings demonstrate that AAU appears best-positioned to impact change at the network and national levels, although its influence clearly was felt by the individual project sites. In particular, interview data revealed AAU’s particular perceived strengths in working with national groups; helping shape national priorities and funding; helping garner media attention; and influencing administrators’ perspectives and priorities. Placing more emphasis on these may advance future AAU efforts. 

AAU’s most effective roles in improving STEM undergraduate teaching are based on leveraging its influence. The data in this report demonstrates the importance of maximizing AAU’s organizational prestige and reputation to garner support for change at institutional and network levels. As an organization representing leading U.S. graduate-level universities, AAU can influence the values and priorities operating across the higher education enterprise. By itself, AAU’s launch of the Undergraduate STEM Education Initiative helped increase the attention paid to undergraduate teaching at its member institutions and arguably at other research institutions. The strategies that leveraged AAU’s influence in this manner included: name dropping AAU institutions to influence colleagues; branding the project as an AAU effort; creating competition among peer institutions; creation of a peer or comparison group (i.e., project sites and an AAU Network); media attention; rewards and recognition; site visits; and partnering with external groups.

AAU used framing and messaging strategies to help increase the value or at least the attention paid to teaching in higher education. Institutional logics are socially constructed patterns of practices, assumptions, values, and beliefs through which people attribute meaning to their social world. Logics govern individual and organizational action by dictating sources of legitimacy within an organizational field. For the last century at least, the logics governing work in research universities emphasize the importance of research and graduate education, encouraging the faculty to pay more attention to research and scholarship than teaching, especially undergraduate teaching.

Logics are often deeply embedded in organizations and the individuals within them, which can lead to unquestioned acceptance of norms. However, new or emergent logics can be introduced and legitimated through language and discourse by developing frames that resonate with their target audiences. For example, AAU developed language to enhance the prestige of teaching by, e.g., making its members “as excellent in teaching as they are in research.” This frame aligned with the existing values and priorities (“excellence” as a desirable standard in research universities) of its target audience. Because of AAU’s expansive network and influence, the frame has been widely adopted, prompting the beginning of a shift in institutional logics. In addition, AAU was very successful in establishing a contradiction that helps people engage new logics. In particular, AAU set up a major contradiction using the idea that “great institutions cannot be poor at teaching.” Variations of this phrase were used (research universities as the epitome of excellence for research should reflect this excellence in teaching, etc.) but all emphasized the same logic: As the epitomes of excellence, AAU institutions should not tolerate having a major portion of their work—undergraduate teaching—be considered poor.

AAU used a variety of strategies to disseminate and embed the recreated logics. These included the various networks that AAU had created as part of the Initiative as well as the points of contact at most member institutions as part of the AAU STEM Network. Additionally, the AAU president described the focus of the Initiative at each meeting. The new logic was listed on the AAU website, noted in listserv messages to the campus points of contact and project site leaders, and included in newsletters and other outreach. The Framework for Systemic Change to Undergraduate STEM Teaching and Learning document describing the rationale for change and the strategies employed made clear that AAU was an important mechanism for disseminating the new logic by having a concrete image and reference point for the logic in the change process.

Because of the academic and research excellence of its members, AAU is one of a few actors in American higher education that can shape institutional logics, establish contradictions, and impact areas such as reward structures in the long run through changes in logics/values. For these reasons, AAU is an essential player in achieving systemic change in undergraduate STEM education.

Rather than limiting its efforts to the original eight project sites, AAU focused from the start on building a network of its members to support undergraduate STEM reform. Research suggests that evidence of improved practices is a necessary but not sufficient condition to create and sustain change. Institutional and interpersonal networks, and peer interactions are crucial in changing ideas and practices. AAU leveraged networks to scale change at all three levels of the system, its campuses, subgroups on campuses, coalitions focused on STEM education, and external groups. These groups serve different purposes, including influence, learning, funding and resources, dissemination, and emotional support. This report describes promising networking practices including identifying peer networks, providing opportunities for networking, and identifying network subgroups. This report also demonstrates the importance of connecting multiple networks, providing support for networks, and developing leadership to maintain networks. The multiple network functions within the AAU Initiative would not have flourished without the planning and attention of AAU staff. AAU was effective at creating and leveraging networks to scale change because networking builds on AAU’s image as representing prestigious institutions and effectively advancing important policy initiatives.

The study also identified ways that networking could be improved. The recommendations include: identifying the right network members; empowering the AAU STEM community to lead; creating network leadership by tapping existing president, provost, and dean networks; broadening on-campus teams; networking department chairs; and distributing ownership and leadership for networks.

AAU focused on information sharing and learning in the STEM Initiative. Networks facilitate information sharing and the circulation of new ideas. Although important to promote change, information sharing is only a precursor to learning and does not guarantee adoption of changes. Study data reflects that information sharing was prevalent through AAU networks, but learning was mentioned much less often than other strategies such as influence and framing. Key areas where adoption of teaching-related innovations occurred across campuses included data analytics, curriculum, facilities to support active teaching, pedagogy and the like.

AAU initially supported organizational learning by considering how to structure the project site work plans, including the use of data, working collectively in teams, and working across departments. More direct AAU influences on organizational learning took place through site visits and AAU STEM Initiative meetings. Finally, the request for proposal (RFP) process and entities such as Faculty Learning Communities promoted local organizational learning.

Several factors appear to have shaped the degree of learning and adoption of practices across AAU campuses. On the positive side, AAU helped establish new norms (i.e., to improve undergraduate STEM teaching), which had to take hold before the adoption of new practices and learning occurred. Potentially negative factors affecting organizational learning included perceptions that practices were not applicable unless invented at the specific campus (the “not invented “here” syndrome), competition among campuses, and the need for data from the local context to support any change.

AAU used multiple strategies and theories of change simultaneously to help accelerate change. Among other strategies, AAU used a combination of influence, systems approaches, organizational learning, institutionalization, cultural approaches, and shifting norms. Multiple theories of change can help motivate and persuade campuses to change, offer them rationales to do so, make changes to infrastructure, and facilitate adoption of new ideas and practices.

This study first identified the value of using several theories of action to create synergy to amplify the change. Second, this study also illustrated how national organizations can reflect on their organizational identity, assets and niche in determining which theories of action to use. Third, intentional deployment of theories can assist in maximizing the effect of the theory by fully planning its use. In a project of this complexity, a single approach would have limited the impact, scale and opportunity for change. Synergy can be achieved between approaches; often one approach helped support another change strategy. As a respected voice in higher education, AAU was able to leverage its influence (a tactic deriving from institutional theory) toward change and create new institutional logics that reshape values. Through its national prestige and influence, AAU was also able to leverage the open systems approach, and to impact groups such as the National Science Foundation and the National Academies of Science to create support for improving teaching. AAU is one of the few groups with the prestige to align many different players/organizations within the higher education system to create a powerful and aligned network of action. Using these various approaches together resulted in AAU’s success in scaling change to date, but relying on any one strategy would have been limiting.

AAU’s most effective role in fostering change was perceived differently by various participants. In developing strategies for complex change processes, it is important to consider the backgrounds and experiences of various stakeholders. The Framework attempted to distinguish stakeholders in part by identifying distinct levels of internal and external effects on STEM teaching as well as distinct stakeholder groups. Even so, the Framework is insufficiently detailed to provide specific strategies for member institutions. Instead, a local needs assessment to identify stakeholders and their needs must complement the more general AAU Framework to promote effective change on local campuses, and to identify strategies for distinct stakeholder groups to make the most of their connection with AAU.

For example, administrators were much more aware of AAU’s prestige than were faculty members. Administrators were also more knowledgeable about the role of AAU in shaping the overall landscape of higher education. As one consequence, faculty members and administrators of various types often differed in how they perceived AAU’s role in fostering the use of evidence-based teaching in STEM on their campuses.

It seems unlikely that AAU as an organization is in the best position to address various group needs on individual campuses. One option to meet the needs of multiple constituent groups is to conduct a needs assessment and determine which needs are best met by AAU and which are best met by other actors. AAU could consider partnerships or brokering with other organizations that might be better able to meet these needs.

AAU’s work was similar to, but also departed from, traditional theories of university reform. There are three key aspects to traditional theories of scaling reform examined in this study: deliberation, networks, and external supports. Opportunities for deliberation and dialogue among professionals – such as convenings, conferences, and meetings – develop motivation, interest, and ownership. Through dialogue, norms and values are explored and changed as people accept new ways of doing things. Networks connect people to others with similar ideas and also provide change agents with the information, incentives, and social capital that facilitates the change process. Networks also reduce risk-taking by having groups of people experiment together. External mechanisms of support can take many forms ranging from concept papers and frameworks to funding, awards, and recognition necessary to help sustain change agents in the face of entropy and even negative dynamics. These strategies acknowledge that individuals (or even individual campuses) cannot successfully act alone to scale changes and that their environments must be reshaped to support the changes themselves. An individual campus is unlikely to act outside the norms, messages and incentives developed within the broader enterprise of higher education. Disciplinary societies, national organizations, and regional groups all shape and influence campus behaviors, including individual faculty behaviors. Aligning messages among groups provides motivation for change.

To some extent, AAU utilized all three components of theories of scale – deliberation, networks, and external supports. AAU created a network of networks that scaled changes across many departments, campuses, and organizations. The AAU STEM Initiative also provided important external supports. AAU was not as successful in creating deliberation as it was with the other two strategies. AAU’s most effective strategy for scaling reform involved its status as a prestige organization with the power to reshape the higher education enterprise – a significant departure from traditional theories of scaling reform.

AAU can maximize its impact on STEM education reform by finding ways to incorporate the quality of teaching into its overall mission. Data suggest that AAU can be a stronger force for improving the quality of instruction in higher education by leading the charge. The AAU STEM Initiative is certainly one part of that message, as is making clear that AAU is committed to maintaining its effort in improving education for the long run. More complex are steps to add a teaching component to membership criteria. Interviewees tended to support a modification in AAU membership. Many member institutions look to AAU for clues about institutional performance. Finding additional ways to make clear that undergraduate teaching quality and effectiveness is a fundamental expectation for AAU members is an important step in this process.

Lessons for National Organizations

Although the study provides important feedback for AAU to hone its strategy, larger lessons about the role of national organizations in reforming undergraduate education also emerged. The concepts of mapping strengths and capabilities, having concrete plans about influence, optimizing networks, and practices for maximizing learning are likely transferable to these other settings. Furthermore, many of the principles that emerged could also be utilized in regional or local organizations. The report ends with key recommendations for other external organizations and stakeholders interested in scaling changes. A practitioner’s guide is available online.