Higher Education Redesign Accelerator

“The Redesign Accelerator not only catalyzes creativity, it provides a reliable process—a playbook—for how to tackle the thorny challenges facing higher education.”

Dr. Dan Greenstein, Chancellor, Pennsylvania’s State System of Higher Education

The University Design Institute (UDI) at Arizona State University launched an Redesign Accelerator in partnership with the Pennsylvania State System of Higher Education (PASSHE) in 2021. Funded by a grant from the ECMC Foundation, the accelerator is a multi-month, immersive experience designed to advance high impact student outcomes in public universities. 

Teams from participating PASSHE universities (e.g., PennWest, Shippensburg, Millersville, and Slippery Rock) engaged in design sessions to develop ideas, learn from each other and prepare for implementation with team coaching support from January to August 2022. Each team was charged to develop a pilot program to advance student success at their institution. They created a proposal to outline their “Big Idea” along with the 9-month pilot plan, including identifying stakeholders, a timeline of key activities, learning goals, and metrics. Upon completion of the accelerator programming, each approved institution was granted a $60,000 subaward to implement their pilot proposal.

“This experience has really been amazing for Slippery Rock University (SRU). It has brought a broad, cross-section of leaders together, they've learned alot about how to move change forward, they are catalyzed around making progress and change where it is needed and this initiative has fostered that for them. They feel broadly supported by their campus and their campus leadership.” 
Brian Danielson Ed.D Director, Center for Teaching and Learning, Quality Matters Coordinator, Slippery Rock University

The pilot projects for each institution are ongoing. We have extended the implementation time for an additional 6-months in order for the teams to gather more information and feedback about their pilots. In brief, here are descriptions of their pilots:

Slippery Rock University will be developing an accelerated, faculty-driven, student-centered curriculum redesign process that aims to identify and remove curricular barriers within existing academic programs. The pilot program will collaborate with an academic department on working a process to identify potential curricular barriers, design and implement curricular corrections, and assess the impact of the process on student retention within the Major at the University.

Shippensburg University - Making Academic Strides Together (MAST) wants to holistically support incoming, first-year students’ academic, social, personal, and career development for their entire first full academic year to improve student outcomes. This innovative integration of advising, student success, and instruction provides 360-degree wraparound support preventing student harm from common pitfalls plaguing first-year college students.

Penn West University - Creating a trained innovation team that coordinates regular student, staff/faculty, and employer/alumni feedback loops that provide stakeholders an opportunity to have their voices heard and share concerns or ideas to improve the student experience/success. Data will be used to fuel innovations and initiatives towards a more student-centered university.

Millersville University will create a university wide, diverse task force to undertake the pilot work to create an evaluative EPPIIC (Exploration, Public Mission, Professionalism, Integrity, Inclusion, Compassion) framework to define the MU experience, and to utilize, integrate, and celebrate all campus constituents as a part of the development and feedback process. 

The feedback received thus far has been overwhelmingly positive, highlighting the success and effectiveness of our efforts. Building on this momentum, the cohort eagerly anticipates reconvening in September, to share the latest updates and insights with the entire group. As the conclusion in December approaches, our excitement grows in anticipation of learning about the final pilot outcomes and the valuable knowledge and experience gained throughout this journey.

In January 2024, UDI will launch the next Redesign Accelerator cohort. For more information please contact: udi@asu.edu.

Click here to learn more about the Redesign Accelerator.