I just spent the last 4 hours listening to the rest of my class mates give mock “board room” presentations on how they would fix a given problem at a number of companies. Some of the presentations were pretty good, but one dominant theme came through in all of them.
Each team really consists of 1 (maybe 2) people who can really pull their weight, and the rest simply sit back and ride on coattails. And the nature of the team based assignments and grading system at UOP are responsible for this. When facilitators do not, as a rule, give each member of a team different grades for a team presentation, you end up with an imbalance of effort, and of learning.
If someone is allowed to stand in the shadows, then not only are they hurting the team grade (assuming the instructor correctly counts off for that) but they are also hurting themselves by passing up a productive opportunity to overcome any issues they have with public speaking. If for some reason the instructor is not marking down a team because they do not all participate, then the instructor is doing a disservice to all the team members, class members, and students as they are allowing a portion of the team to slip by without having to learning anything and without consequence.
The entire team-model at UOP is a broken concept, and needs to be re-engineered. In IT we would say it needs to be refactored.
In my opinion, the best way to solve the team issues at UOP are.
- Force a 50% turnover in team members in each class. This will help reduce the stagnation, and will help to expose those who are making a career out of riding someones coattails. It will also reduce burnout, and students might actually learning something from having to work with different people.
It is also more like real world situations, where the employee is not generally picking his or her co-workers, but must still find a way to survive. - Force team members to identify who is responsible for each section of any given assignment. If the team is truly collaborating on the entire paper (as some actually do) then notate that on the assignment. But most teams I have seen use the “divide and conquer” method where the split the assignment up, do their individual portions, and then compile it together at the end. If each person has to notate which piece was theirs, then the instructor can balance their individual effort with the entire teams. This will create some variance in team member grades for a given assignment. But again, this will expose those who aren’t pulling their weight.
- Require the teams to complete team evaluations each week. I know the school requires them at the end of each class, but most classes I have been in do not actually require or collect them, and I have not seen any thing happen as a result of those surveys. My academic counselor told me that they can adjust a team members grade based on the surveys, but I have seen no evidence that it actually happens.
The other half of the model that I think is broken, is when students are asked to take examples from their work, like in my current class, and use that for analysis. We have to have quantifiable information to determine the problem, which really focuses us down to a small set of issues we can tackle. Combine that with working for a company that doesn’t fit the mold, and you are left digging through SEC filings as your dominant way to get corporate information. This not only limits the students ability to apply other classes (like HR, Organizational Behavior, Quality Management, Employment Law), but it can impact motivation and in my case makes me feel like i am at a disadvantage because i can’t pick a more personal company.
If the class requires using examples, the school should make virtual organizations available for use, and it needs to drastically expand the choices and the detail available. If done correctly, these organizations could accurately reflect the job market of the surrounding campus, making it easier for students to apply the topics in a fairly realistic setting.
As a final note, if any members of the UOP administration or staff, actually read this, contact me. I do not want to just sit here in the blogosphere complaining, but my efforts as a student to make change have been ignored. So I have turned to this. I welcome the opportunity to sit down, in person if needed, and discuss my frustrations with UOP and any other topic I have listed here. I have already sent several e-mails to my academic counselor and the the dean for my campus with this same offer, but the school has yet to accept. So I am extending it to the greater UOP community.
I will gladly provide my full name and identify to anyone who is willing to engage in a discussion with me on these topics. But if you are not, and are only going to read my blog, then all you get is J.
October 30, 2007 at 3:56 am
It is not a learning model– it is a business model. In the world of work the the famous 80% 20% rule appies as well. It is not fixable. It can not be refactore or reformed.
This is how the corporate world functions. It is worse in the public sector. In the end it is why large corporations are eventualy fail. Now if you think that UOP is in the education buisness then you may be forgiven for thinking that they may wish to reform, but in fact the system is designed to allow the maximum number of students to continue to pay for classes, with out exposing the fraud. The best way to do this is allow students to coatail on others– they will not fail and the work will be done so the eduactors can pretend that eduaction has occured. I am sorry to break it to you this bluntly but the they system is functioning as designed and producing the iintended results– income to UOP.
In the business world all that matters is that the work get done– it does not matter by whom,and it does not matter that they are fairly compensated for their efforts. It would seem that laying off deadweight would reudce costs, but that would also have the effect of elimiating many middle managment jobs -and as it happens these are the people to would need to identify the deadwood. There is a confilic fo interest here. In any case may of the manager are deadwood themselves. and would need to fire themsleves as well.
If you realy want to change UOP you must realise that as long as you are willing to put up with it it will not change,and you must leave to make the point. Only when there is no longer anyone left to do the work at all will the system fail.
Just like a work–then the real “creative destruction of capitalism can show its stuff.
I am sorry to be so pesimistic but after 3 classes at UOP and 18 years in the corporte world I know of what I speek. Good luck and thanks for writeing this. I may save others from being defruaded as well.
February 28, 2008 at 9:38 pm
I am an adjuct prof at UOP and I appreciate your comments. These are some good insights which I will use to improve my summer courses. In response to the above response, I have been pleased to see the corporate side of UOP not interfere with the academic side. As a result of a poor grade in my class, one student was put on academic probabtion and not allowed to register for more classes. I also reported one student to the admin for academic dishonesty. Although this reduced income for UOP, I was happy to see the administration stand by the established academic policies.
March 30, 2008 at 8:02 pm
It amazes me how anyone with a connection in the business world can be shocked at what happens in educational systems; as if they were utopias where only learning and growing mattered. Universities, ALL of them, are out to make money and increase power and standing in the communities. That is an institutional setting does not reduce it, it just places more layers on it to the stakeholders…..Sports which draw huge crowds and money ALWAYS override tutoring for the students.
I chose UOP for the teams; professionally to have a place to ‘play’ with the teams is what I needed. What do you think teams in the workforce do? I am already in the position I will have upon graduation. UOP offers me the chance to learn about people and teams without making 50,000 mistakes. As for information and content, read. Read international magazines; attend business seminars- and the next time you want to single out a university, try OSU in Stillwater Oklahoma; they took peoples HOMES to build a bigger stadium, to increase crowd size, to bring in more money.
At least UOP makes no bones that it is a money maker; that is what pisses you and other off, they don’t lie and give you this warm soft fuzzy about taking your money.
Life is unfair- BOO HOO- go to Kenya and try hauling water 3 miles to grow an acre of wheat.
March 31, 2008 at 1:25 am
UOP Masters-
First of all, by your tone I can take a guess that you really think UOP is a great and wonderful place, and ideal education for the “business world”. Otherwise why would you defend it so vehemently.
1. I never said other schools weren’t out to make money. I did say, in mulitple posts, that most schools realize that the way to make money in education, is to increase your standing in the academic community. Look at places like Harvard, Yale, or any other Ivy league school. They make money based on their reputation as a good school that will help get people good jobs. UOP took a different approach, and focused on quantity not quality. Both can be successful business models, and the quantity approach is definitely more effective in the short-term. But that doesn’t make them a good school, which is what I was saying.
2. If you think that the teams at UOP are anything like the teams in the corporate world, then you are experiencing one of three things. A. Your classmates are infinitely better than mine were. B. You have really low quality co-workers and team-members in your work. C. You have ingested large amounts of illegal substances and have lost touch with reality.
3. I am not going to defend OSU. I don’t think they should have taken peoples homes. But just because UOP isn’t the only school that is bad doesn’t excuse their behavior. Besides, I have no personal connection with OSU, so anything I would say about them would be less than justified.
4. UOP didn’t lie about taking my money. However, they did lie about the quality of the education I would receive. Maybe I just got a bad set of classes or a bad campus. Maybe you just happen to be in the smartest group to ever attend UOP. However, it doesn’t matter why the education sucked, it still sucked. When you promise quality education for the money, and don’t deliever, I think you give people a right to complain.
August 29, 2008 at 3:13 am
Aha! Josh most of the education obtained at UOP is designed to encourage you to teach yourself. So if you feel the education sucks, then you have your self to blame. Your class facilitator is obligated to assist you with things you don’t understand and encourage you to figure them out, but ultimately it is on you. What better education is there than experience? UOP is trying to prepare you to be self reliant and to be smart enough to lead or find your place in a team setting. If you miss this after my response then I pity you. I wish you the best. Stay positive it will make sense when you least expect it.