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"Our education system is losing relevance. Here's how to unleash its potential"

4/17/2020

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The headline is from this article at the World Economic Forum:
https://www.weforum.org/agenda/2020/04/our-education-system-is-losing-relevance-heres-how-to-update-it/

The 2020 coronavirus pandemic instantly changed the ways we teach and the ways students learn. Except for those of us who already were teaching fully online courses, this was hugely disruptive. In my case, I was teaching a Master's-level fully online course for students at Daemen College, Buffalo, NY, and three fully seated undergraduate courses for University of North Carolina Asheville (UNC Asheville).

The online students had established their pace and were doing fine before Daemen College halted all seated classes. Nevertheless, I realized that some of those students would have had seated classes abruptly converted to online. I had to think about how this might affect them - not to mention how the stress, economic impact, and fear, caused by the pandemic was affecting their lives. The semester is ongoing, and the students seem to be OK. The end-of-semester student evaluations of my teaching will give me some ideas for improvement. We might have to teach fully online during the fall 2020 semester, and the feedback can help me adjust my methods to improve the students' learning experiences.

The fully seated students in my three UNC Asheville courses had the biggest shock - the shock millions of students in the U.S.A. and other countries experienced when their school shut the classrooms (and dormitories) and everything went virtual. Because I use team-based project-based-learning methods, the students were able to continue working in teams using whatever collaboration methods (i.e., Google Hangouts, Zoom, FaceTime, etc.) worked for them. I meet with these students weekly in 20-30 live online meetings. After a full-class live session, we break into team groups on Zoom and I meet with each group. To my surprise, I am having more direct interaction with my students in these courses than I had before we moved to online education. They are comfortable talking one-on-one and in small groups online - much more than in the classroom.

This is the time for us as educators to think seriously about how we teach and how students learn. The World Economic Forum article provides ideas to start our reflection.

#daemencollege #uncasheville #highereducation #experientiallearning #onlinelearning #pedagogy

Photo by Paul McAfee @ UNC Asheville with the students and a guest speaker, 2020.

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Project-Based Learning for marketing students at UNC Asheville

1/29/2020

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UNC Asheville Media Design Lab Manager Sasha Hussey hosted our Marketing Promotion students on Monday. Sasha introduced the students to the amazing resources available in the Media Lab and explained the resources in the TV Studio.

The Marketing Promotion students are working in small teams with two local companies to develop Integrated Brand Promotion campaigns for the organizations. Three teams are working with non-profit OM Sanctuary (https://omsanctuary.org/), and three teams are working with the Asheville Plato's Closet store (https://www.platoscloset.com/location/asheville-nc/). 

The students have access to recording equipment with sound booths, computers, software, cameras, and other resources they can use to develop their campaigns. The staff and volunteers at the Media Design Lab will work with the students to help them use the equipment and software.
This is Project-Based Learning at its best (in my not necessarily humble opinion).

#unca #uncasheville #newmedia #integratedbrandpromotion #marketingpromotion #projectbasedlearning
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UNC Asheville Marketing Students working with non-profit OM Sanctuary

1/23/2020

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Thank you to Mary Liske, Wellness Coordinator, for a hugely productive and engaging conversation with our UNC Asheville Marketing Promotion students last night.

Three teams of Marketing Promotion students will develop promotional campaigns for non-profit OM Sanctuary during this semester in a process called Project-Based Learning. They will be applying what they are learning in the course as they work with OM Sanctuary as their Integrated Brand Promotion (IBP) client to meet the client's goals.

Project-Based Learning is one form of experiential learning. In this Marketing Promotion course, the students work all semester to develop an Integrated Brand Promotion campaign to support goals set by OM Sanctuary.


OM Sanctuary is officially known as Oshun Mountain Sanctuary. This non-profit organization was formed in 2012 as a response to the increasing number of people of all ages, cultures, and income levels seeking holistic and healthy methods for stress reduction, living in balance, embracing sustainable practices, and bringing inspiration into their personal and professional lives.

#projectbasedlearning #experientiallearning. #omsanctuary #uncasheville #maryliske #universityofnorthcarolina #asheville #integratedbrandpromotion

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Project-Based Learning in Asheville, NC

8/31/2019

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​My University of North Carolina Asheville Consumer Behavior class is working in teams with local organizations. One team will be working on a consumer marketing project with ASAP - Appalachian Sustainable Agriculture Project. ASAP manages a Saturday morning farmer's market in downtown Asheville, so I visited this morning to learn more.
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Business Strategy Simulation

7/13/2019

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Since 2012, I have taught the capstone Strategic Management course in the following institutions:
  1. Keuka College, Ho Chi Minh City, Vietnam (2016)
  2. University at Buffalo School of Management in Singapore (2016-2019)
  3. University at Buffalo School of Management in Buffalo (2016-2019)
  4. Canisius College in Buffalo, in both the undergraduate and MBA capstone courses (2019).​
Teaching in three countries at four campuses, has helped me develop the use of the Business Strategy Game simulation (https://www.bsg-online.com/) into the undergraduate capstone courses.
The students make 57 decisions weekly for each year of the simulation, covering business operations in the following areas:
  1. ​Corporate social responsibility and citizenship (up to 8 decision entries).
  2. Production operations (up to 11 decision entries per production facility, with a maximum of 4 plants).
  3. The addition of facility space, equipment, and production improvement options (up to 8 decision entries per production facility).
  4. Worker compensation and training (up to 6 decision entries per production facility).
  5. Shipping and distribution center operations (up to 5 decision entries per geographic region).
  6. Pricing and marketing (up to 9 decision entries in each of 4 geographic regions).
  7. Offers to sign celebrities (2 decision entries per offer).
  8. Financing of company operations (up to 8 decision entries).
Each week represents a year of business operations in a global shoe industry. The students are divided into teams, with each team representing one international shoe company, and the entire class represents the worldwide industry. The teams compete with each other.
Students approach the simulation in one of two ways. The majority of the students see it as a game and simply guess. A few student teams realize that this is their opportunity to apply their undergraduate studies into one course, using the skills they have gained from their business education to make holistic decisions in competition with the other teams (companies). It is these few groups of students who learn the most from this simulation.
This is an example of Project-Based Learning. The students learn from experience. They analyze their strategic positions, make decisions weekly, and then see the results of their decisions on Monday mornings.
After graduation, students have contacted me after job interviews to tell me that when they explained their work in the simulation, the interview took notice, exploring in greater depth what they had done and learned. These students tell me that their experience, and discussing it with interviewers, has helped them stand out from other candidates, and in some instances, get jobs.
I'm about to start two new sections of Strategic Management at the University of North Carolina at Asheville. With my own learning experiences from using the simulation, I hope these two capstone sections to be the most productive for the students ever. I'll report back at the end of the coming fall semester.
#project-based learning #experientiallearning #businessstrategygame #bsg #unca #uncAsheville #universityofnorthcarolinaatasheville
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Welcome. I've Left Facebook but you can find me here.

12/19/2018

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Welcome to my personal website. If you have arrived because you saw my post that I will be deleting my Facebook account, I am honored. This website primarily documents my exploration of experiential learning in higher education. 

There are three active blogs here, one for research information, and another for my teaching activities. The third has some of my drone photography adventures. 

I will add a fourth, more personal, blog to replace what I might otherwise have posted on Facebook. If you are interested, please follow one or more of these. I also continue to maintain a profile on LinkedIn, and you may wish to follow me there: https://www.linkedin.com/in/paulmcafee/

Merry Christmas and Happy New Year.
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Entrepreneurship Project-based learning in Singapore

11/16/2018

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Thank you to Avis Easteal, #Luxasia Regional Head of Consumer. Avis joined our University at Buffalo, Singapore, Entrepreneurship students to talk about marketing on Friday, November 9, 2018.
My wife and I met Mrs. Easteal by chance over the weekend. We learned how she and her company market based on data analysis and delivering superior customer experiences. Her talk with the class brought what my students had been studying had been studying to life. The sample perfumes she handed out brightened up the room.
This Entrepreneurship class incorporates Project-Based Learning (PBL). During the first week of the semester, the students form teams and decide on a business idea they want to develop. Throughout the semester, we intersperse readings and lectures on business processes, especially as they relate to startups. The students apply what they are learning to the creation of a business plan that includes financial, operations, and marketing plans. They create an investor pitch that the teams deliver in the final week of class.
Many students commented in their weekly journal entries that Mrs. Easteal's discussion of delivering customer experiences, and of gathering and using customer data effectively, applied to their projects, giving them new ideas. Mrs. Easteal also took time to meet with each of the teams to review their business ideas and to give them feedback. The weekly journal entries that week indicated that many of the teams benefited from her feedback.
Is a guest lecture or presentation experiential learning? The evidence from this activity indicates that when the students can connect the presentation content to their projects, what they learn from the presentation enhances their learning from the projects.
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Strategic management PBL in singapore

10/30/2018

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This is an example of Project-Based Learning.

The strategic management students are working on final presentations of their three-year strategic plan outcomes within a global strategy simulation in an athletic shoe industry. This is a semester-long project, culminating in the final presentation of the analysis of the strategic plan outcomes.

The teacher (i.e., me) ceases to be the "sage on the stage" and becomes a consultant. The teacher visits the student teams, and the students come for advice and consultation.

Both strategy classes this semester have been fully engaged, and their results within the simulation have been outstanding.
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Project-Based Learning in Singapore with indra Wijaya

9/12/2018

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Entrepreneur and educator Indra Wijaya visited my University at Buffalo Entrepreneurship & Small Business class in Singapore this morning. He talked about the business he has started, and he worked with some of the project teams.
The students have grouped into their course-long working teams. Each team has a leader who wishes to develop a business plan for a new business.
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Building drones to learn stem

4/15/2018

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The image above is not linked. Click here to view the video.
Building Drones to Learn STEM

STEM is Science, Technology, Engineering and Math. This video illustrates an experiential learning activity - building drones - to learn about STEM subjects by creating a complex device. Take a minute and a half to watch the video and discover this program.


https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dxGA2BLDiJM

Following is an excerpt from the article that reported on this program. Click here for the link to the original article.

Article Excerpt

Creatrex Education is a relatively new company, arriving on the scene in 2012 with an interesting mission: Get kids excited by science, technology, engineering and math, or STEM.

Their plan is to get kids to build flying drones at school. Creatrex representatives will come to interested schools and guide teachers in building drones to fly in their gyms.

Creatrex co-owner Terence Fagan said there are three model kits. The first is a basic snap-together model designed for fourth- and fifth- graders. The second, created for middle school students, introduces soldering and software to the mix. The high school version is made of metal and is a more complex, powerful model.

While robotics clubs exist in schools across the globe, Creatrex hopes their flying drone projects will pique the interest of even more potential STEM majors.

“The big thing that they’re learning is confidence,” Creatrex co-owner Gerald Holt said, “as well as working through failure and difficult situations. So, at the end of it they should have the skills that a hands-on engineer would need.”

Administrators interested in the drone program can contact Creatrex directly at
http://www.creatrexeducation.com/. 
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    Paul McAfee

    My experiential learning Activities blog includes examples from my international teaching experiences. The Research blog includes studies I have read and comments on others' research, as well as my own.

    Read about examples from my teaching college business courses in China, Singapore, the United States, and Vietnam, relating to both experiential learning and project-based learning.

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