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Against all odds: transforming institutional culture.

Article Excerpt
IN RECENT YEARS, the University of Michigan-Flint has undertaken more new initiatives than most institutions tackle over an entire generation. Since 2004, we have produced an ambitius five year strategic plan, adopted an ambitious five-year strategic plan, adopted a decentralized budget process, committed to increasing enrollment by 25 percent, reformed our general education program, and begun the transition from a commuter to a residential campus. Some of these initiatives were dictated by outside forces; others represent responses to growing internal calls for change.

Engaging in institution-wide change requires examining institutional culture--defined by the set of shared attitudes, values, goals, and practices that characterize the institution (Trice and Beyer 1984)--and, when necessary, engaging in cultural change. Colleges and universities are historically slow to make changes to institutional culture, however. They tend to seek extensive deliberation and study, which too often result in resistance to change.

The types of change needed to meet demands for a twenty-first-century education require us to rethink not only who is involved, but also how decision making and implementation occur. As R. Eugene Rice (2006) has observed, institutional change requires serious consideration, buy-in, and support from all stakeholders. While faculty are central to the success of almost any institutional change effort, it is also essential that staff, students, administrators, governing boards, and the community at large be given real opportunities for involvement in decision-making processes.

Like other higher education institutions, our university has certainly struggled with its share of failed attempts at change. At times, it has seemed as though we have abandoned nearly as many initiatives as we have begun. But for a relatively brief moment during the 2005-6 academic year, our whole campus was moving together, at the same time, and in the same direction. Something was different this time.

Fostering campus engagement

In reforming our general education program, one of our major initiatives, we consciously chose to alter the way we address campuswide issues. Instead of our traditional approach--appointing a committee and charging it to bring back to the campus a fully realized plan or solution--we separated the content of the project from the processes for addressing it.

At an Association of American Colleges and Universities (AAC&U) Institute on General Education, former AAC&U Vice President Andrea Leskes...