Embedding Flexible Active Learning Across a Faculty of Science and Engineering: A Structured Change Management Approach

Practice Paper Recommended citation: Simmons, L., Langan, M. A., Cullen, R. W., & Saunders, F. C. (2025). Embedding Flexible Active Learning Across a Faculty of Science and Engineering: A Structured Change Management Approach. In Kangaslampi, R., Langie, G., Järvinen, H.-M., & Nagy, B. (Eds.), SEFI 53rd Annual Conference. European Society for Engineering Education (SEFI), Tampere, Finland. DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.17631766. This Conference Paper is brought to you for open access by the 53rd Annual Conference of the European Society for Engineering Education (SEFI) at Tampere University in Tampere, Finland. This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-Share Alike 4.0 International License. EMBEDDING FLEXIBLE ACTIVE LEARNING ACROSS A FACULTY OF SCIENCE AND ENGINEERING: A STRUCTURED CHANGE MANAGEMENT APPROACH. L. Simmonsa, A. M. Langanb, W. R. Cullenc, F. C. Saundersd, 1 aFaculty of Science and Engineering, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK, https://orcid.org/ 0000-0002-1683-2528 bFaculty of Science and Engineering, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-0482-1987 cCentre for Learning Enhancement and Educational Development, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK, https://orcid.org/ 0009-0008-3809-9401 dCentre for Learning Enhancement and Educational Development, Manchester Metropolitan University, Manchester, UK, https://orcid.org/0000-0002-1644-2511 Conference Key Areas: Curriculum development and emerging curriculum models in engineering; Digital tools and AI in engineering education Keywords: education change; flexible active learning; change management ABSTRACT In the summer of 2024, over 400 academics in the Faculty of Science and Engineering at Manchester Metropolitan University moved into the newly constructed ‘Dalton’ building. This major investment in teaching and research space afforded a strategic opportunity to bring flexible active learning to the fore across all Science and Engineering disciplines, in line with the University’s Digitally Enhanced Learning Teaching and Assessment Strategy. This was a strategic imperative, as the Dalton building was designed with only two traditional lecture theatres. In the context of nervousness about what teaching would look like in the new building and, in places, a lack of knowledge of what flexible active learning entails, it was clear that without a strong academic vision and a structured change management process, inertia might lead to an undesirable outcome of ‘new building - same old pedagogy’. This paper describes how we deployed a change management approach to bring our science and engineering academic community on a journey to new pedagogical practices – rooted in flexible active learning. Our aim was to increase awareness and application of flexible active learning within the faculty, developing resources to support colleagues and working with targeted “faculty” trailblazers to demonstrate how flexible active learning could be implemented within the new building. To measure the effectiveness of the approach, we utilised an evaluation framework known as ADKAR. 1 Corresponding Author: F.C. Saunders, [email protected] We will share how we implemented this approach, which is still ongoing, together with its wider applicability for any engineering curriculum development project or broader engineering education change. 1 INTRODUCTION AND THEORETICAL FRAMING 1.1 Active Learning Active learning is a student-centred approach to learning that is aligned with a constructivist theory of education (Doolittle et al., 2023). It is a broad term for a way of learning that promotes active engagement and encourages learners to coconstruct knowledge. Nyugen et al. (2021) define active learning as “classroombased activities designed to engage students in their learning through answering questions, solving problems, discussing content, or teaching others, individually or in groups.” The teaching of engineering in higher education has traditionally engaged students in design projects, laboratory experiments, collaborative work, industry and workplace learning (Institute of Engineering, 2019) often within a framework of problem-based learning (Lacuesta, 2009), reflecting that the discipline lends itself quite naturally to active learning pedagogy. Active learning has also been shown to positively impact student engagement, learning and performance (Deslauriers et al., 2019; Theobald et al., 2020). Several authors have described active learning across a spectrum of increasing complexity (O’Neal & Pinder-Grover, 2020; Watson, 2021). Examples of active learning approaches are provided in Figure 1. Figure 1. Active Learning Spectrum. Broadening active learning to encompass both in person and digital activities, as recommended in the UK’s AdvanceHE flexible curriculum framework (AdvanceHE, 2018), enabled us to define flexible active learning (FAL), as “a learning design concept that engages students in learning by doing using a framework of formal and informal, physical, and online learning spaces that provide flexibility to our students in respect of what, when and how to learn.” Flexible active learning pedagogies embed digital flexibility and choice, allowing students to choose when, where and how to learn and to balance their learning with the rest of their lives. FAL activities can take many forms, be implemented at different scales, be aimed at groups or individual learners, be set in different contexts, and be supported or enhanced with technology 1.2 Structured Change Management Processes Shifting emphasis towards digitally enabled flexible active learning across a large Faculty does not simply happen. Considerable support for educators is needed; giving them the time, space and resources to embrace new flexible active learning based pedagogies. One way of achieving this is to deploy a structured change management approach and associated ADKAR (Awareness, Desire, Knowledge, Ability, Reinforcement) evaluation tool (Hiatt, 2006) to bring educator colleagues on a journey of envisioning, awareness raising, training, experimentation and role modelling flexible active learning approaches. Most structured approaches to change management are multi-step processes (Palmer et al, 2009) but the various models differ not only in the number of steps in the process, but also whether each step must proceed in sequence, and also the extent to which the steps need to be contextualised and adapted to the type of change required (see Kirkpatrick’s (2001) Step by Step Change Model, Taffinder’s (1998) Transformation Trajectory or Leppitt’s (2006) Integrated Model of Change). These approaches all share the need to define a vision, to mobilise and catalyse activity around that vision, to support colleagues to participate and adopt the change, to celebrate successes and to monitor how effectively the change has been implemented. The ADKAR model of change management emphasizes that change happens at the individual level and that addressing these five elements can help overcome resistance and achieve lasting transformation (Hiatt, 2006; Angtyan, 2019). The five steps in the ADKAR approach are: 1. Awareness: Understanding the need for change. 2. Desire: Having the motivation and support to participate in the change. 3. Knowledge: Knowing how to change. 4. Ability: Having the skills and behaviours required to implement the change. 5. Reinforcement: Sustaining the change to ensure it sticks. These steps are typically accompanied by a longitudinal ADKAR survey, that elicits perceptions of the implementation of the change and how sustained it is within the institution. An ADKAR survey instrument provides simplistic quantifiable outcomes that can be used, first as a baseline set of measures and then during project development to provide comparable measures of progress. Utilising formal change management approaches to effect engineering education change is not new. Williams et al. (2025) showcase various case studies of educational change in engineering education. They identify several leadership approaches and change management strategies, specifically the use of adaptive leadership and collaboration to bring about educational change. However, most of the literature in this domain is focussed on effecting wider organisational change in Higher Education (e.g. Storberg-Walker & Torraco, 2004; Woelert, 2021; Vlachopoulos, 2021), rather than deploying change management approaches specifically for pedagogical innovations. There remains considerable scepticism and resistance amongst educators to applying business change management models (e.g. Burnes, 2020; Kotter, 2011), that are more commonly associated with business change projects, rather than matters of pedagogy. The contribution made by this narrative practice paper is to present our experiences of, and reflections on, effecting pedagogical change across a Faculty of Science and Engineering by adopting a structured change management process. The context for the paper is broader than engineering education and is focused on a specific pedagogic shift toward digitally enabled flexible active learning. Therefore, we suggest that our learnings are relevant both to the specific context of engineering education and to any wider curriculum development or education change initiative. 2 CONTEXT Manchester Metropolitan University is a large civic modern University in the United Kingdom. We have a diverse student body and a commitment to widening participation, with over half our students first-in-family to go to university and a third coming from the most economically deprived districts of the UK. Over the last decade, Manchester Met has transformed from being a teaching intensive institution into a ‘dual intensive’ institution where both teaching and research feature strongly. As part of this strategy, the university has invested £115M in a new building for the Faculty of Science and Engineering, the Dalton building, which opened in the summer of 2024. In line with the University’s Education Strategy, the education vision for the Dalton building centred on the adoption of flexible, digitally enhanced, active learning pedagogies in both physical and digital learning spaces. Provision of this digital flexibility across our science and engineering education disciplines was a key driver for the project, as it was perceived to enable our diverse student body to balance learning and life (e.g. other responsibilities such as work, caring etc) away from university. This approach is supported by several studies (e.g. Kuntz et al., 2012; Pinder, 2009; IET, 2019) which argue that particular types of building design can support more collaborative and flexible teaching methods. When aligned with a clarity of vision, support for academic colleagues and a collaborative student learning approach, the move to a new building can facilitate a change to more innovative teaching methods such as active learning. Our structured change management process was designed to build upon existing effective practices within the faculty, to grow and embed consistent Flexible Active Learning (FAL) pedagogies and to take full advantage of the specially designed learning spaces in the new building. The process comprised a number of steps: setting the vision, mobilising and catalysing activity, supporting colleagues to adopt the change, celebrating successes and monitoring change effectiveness. The vision of the project was clear: to increase awareness and adoption of FAL across the Faculty, whilst developing comprehensive support resources for our educators and providing training workshops, and exemplar digitally enhanced FAL modules for colleagues to observe and learn from. This vision was set by the Faculty Director of Education (the most senior educator within the faculty) and a FAL Project Group was mobilised to deliver the education change required. The project group consisted of two academic co-organisers, four departmental active learning leads, an institutionally appointed professional project manager and a communications lead. 3 PROJECT INTERVENTIONS The project group catalysed activity through the delivery of workshops and seminars to enhance staff awareness of, and capability to deliver flexible active learning in the new building. Importantly, the project manager brought accountability to the project and kept the team on task. The project team developed and ran introductory workshops to enhance awareness of FAL through both physical and virtual activities. Workshop design was inclusive, with example-driven activities to show staff an ‘honest and authentic’ view of delivering FAL to large student cohorts. Communications with academic colleagues were directed by the project manager and communications largely driven by Heads of Department. There were follow-up Departmental-level, non-digital workshops to share good practices bespoke to departmental culture and experiences to broaden active learning thinking beyond digital tools. The workshops and webinars were well-attended and feedback on them very positive, with about a third of all academic colleagues in the faculty attending at least one session. The project team also identified and met frequently with four ‘Dynamic Unit Leaders’ (DULs), one from each academic Department, who were staff best positioned to maximise the functionality of the new dynamic learning studios in the new building. These meetings were dialogues to enable and support these staff, to surface concerns and barriers for the delivery of FAL in these new spaces and to provide tangible feedback to the wider project leadership. This premised actions that would benefit all staff who would use these spaces in future, including a DUL-led webinar series that was held later in the project as a means of celebrating successes. An example of the outworking of these groups was the adoption of 3-hour ‘lectorials’ for the teaching of engineering maths (where a lectorial is an integrated teaching session comprising multiple cycles of concept teaching, an activity and debrief). Previously, engineering maths had been taught using the more traditional 1-hour lecture, plus 2-hour workshop format (often timetabled on a different day). The effectiveness of project interventions was measured by running two, educationally adapted, ADKAR surveys. ADKAR survey 1 (May 2023), provided a baseline of staff views of FAL before any interventions had taken place and ADKAR survey 2 (May 2024) was completed after the project interventions. An overview of the project interventions and timings of the ADKAR evaluations is provided in Figure 2. Figure 2. Timeline of Flexible Active Learning project interventions and its evaluation. 2023 2024 2025 Task May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Jul Aug Sep Oct Nov Dec Jan Feb Mar Apr May Jun Baseline ADKAR Survey (ADKAR 1) Visioning and Mobilisation Sharing the Ed Change Project Vision Mobilising the Project Team Interventions Departmental Workshops Introducing Active Learning Departmental Workshops on (Non-digital) Active Learning Dynamic Unit Leader Training and Support Sessions Dynamic Unit Leader Webinar Exemplar Series Additional DELTA workshops Evaluation and Embedding the Change ADKAR Survey 2 Ongoing Support via Dept Communities and MS Teams Channel Sector-leading Resources (eg Interactive AL Specturm) ADKAR Survey 3 (Planned for Summer 2025) AKDAR survey 1 (pre-intervention) received 127 responses from across the Faculty and ADKAR survey 2 (post-intervention) achieved 62 responses, the lower response likely due to staff preparing to decant into the new building at the time of the survey. The comparison of ADKAR survey results preand post-project interventions are summarised in Figure 3. Figure 3: ADKAR survey 1 and 2 results. Figure 3 shows the proportion of positive responses (Agree and Strongly Agree, Aware and Very Aware) in the first ADKAR survey and the change in the proportion of positive responses in the second survey (ADKAR 2). For example, the proportion of positive responses to Awareness increased from 61% in ADKAR 1 to 78% in ADKAR 2 (an overall increase of 17%). Figure 4: ADKAR 2 Survey results comparing responses of Faculty colleagues who attended workshops (known as SPG9) and those who didn’t. Figure 4 a-c show that colleagues who attended the project workshops reported higher levels of awareness of active learning, higher levels of desire to engage in active learning and higher levels of agreement that active learning enhances students’ experience than colleagues who did not attend the workshops. Our findings suggest that awareness of FAL across the faculty was considerably enhanced through the workshops and the exemplars of good practice. The hope that our interventions would associate with enhanced educator “knowledge” of FAL pedagogies and drive ambition to act and implement such approaches within colleagues’ education practice was demonstrated through acknowledgement of the benefits of FAL, but of a lower magnitude than the increase in participant awareness (Figure 3). We also found that participation in workshops was associated with greater positivity across each item on the ADKAR survey, with the greatest differences in areas of awareness, perceived benefits of FAL and the desire to enhance practices. The effects of the larger, self-selecting sample of participants on the outcomes means that cause and effect cannot be implied (i.e. participation in our activities caused positive ADKAR responses), but they are proposed as a surrogate indicator in light of the findings of the qualitative thematic analysis of the participants’ free text comments described below. Thematic analysis of text responses from the surveys are summarised for the ADKAR surveys (Figure 5). This highlighted clear shifts in the focus of participants’ views between survey points. The initial ADKAR survey was distinct in that it captured comments about the challenges and concerns of implementing FAL, as well as capturing suggested benefits such as the value of the new spaces. There were also a variety of concerns expressed, including the impacts of large class sizes, low student attendance and issues with student engagement both face to face and online. In addition, comments raised potential issues relating to working in shared spaces (teaching and staff offices) as well as capacity and technological infrastructure within the new building. In the second survey (post-workshops and webinars), the participant comments focused more on practical and logistical operational needs. At this time, staff still had not had opportunity to work in the new learning spaces, or even see them. However, views had already moved away from pedagogy/principles, and towards the logistics of the move and how to implement FAL as well as highlighting the importance of communication around the process and leadership oversight. Concerns about large cohorts, reliability of technology and educator workloads persisted, as well as bespoke help for students with specific learning needs, but they were more directed at overcoming barriers to deliver FAL. Finally, the project interventions and resources were acknowledged as useful. A summary of this shift in views expressed is shown in Figure 5. Figure 5. Overview of consistency and shifting foci of free text comments between ADKAR1 and ADKAR2 surveys. 4 INSIGHTS, REFLECTIONS AND CONCLUSIONS Evidence from the ADKAR change management surveys, the text comments and ad hoc feedback to the project team strongly suggests that deploying a structured change management process in this project enhanced staff awareness and knowledge of Flexible Active Learning in preparation for the new Science and Engineering building. Those staff that engaged with both workshops and webinars were the most positive about FAL and the intelligence garnered during the project was valuable in multiple ways as the faculty decanted into the new building. Staff views were found to shift from principles and challenges of FAL practices and general concerns about capacity of teaching spaces towards how to operationalise active learning, including logistics, timetabling and the different types of learning spaces. The need for ongoing professional development to enable FAL and the challenges of time and workload were consistent across survey points. In terms of our self-evaluation of the project as the facilitators of the project, there are several key learnings from this project that are transferable to other institutions. For example, using the meetings with the dynamic unit leaders as a focus for enhancing their already expert Active Learning delivery, leading by example by using exemplars of AL in the first set of Departmental workshops, as well as aligning our work closely to institutional educational strategies. We also made it clear we were not policing implementation but rather leading a collegial, evidence-based, strategically aligned project with the hope that everyone had something to contribute to it. Colleagues who were more advanced in their Active Learning practice were encouraged to share and nurture others (whilst still reflecting and improving on their own practices). Deploying a structured change management approach also acted as an important conduit of staff views during the transition into the new building, enabling a smoother and less stressful move into the Dalton Building. Not everything went to plan though. The most difficult part of the structured change management process was responding to the delays in the new building project. We were not able to run the pilots that we had planned, and academics found it difficult to visualise the new teaching spaces and how they would be able to adapt their teaching practice in them. This limited our ability to pilot/test the new teaching spaces with dynamic unit leaders in advance of the shift of all staff and teaching into the new building. Nevertheless, our findings, reflections and experiences on this project have demonstrated that deploying a structured change management process to embed FAL across the Faculty of Science and Engineering has been an important tool for effecting and monitoring educational change. Actively supporting our educators and giving them a clear vision for FAL and the time, space and resources to embrace it, has accelerated the adoption of FAL across the faculty. We also found that the appointment of a professional project manager and the formal management and reporting structures of the wider project, attached a profile and priority to the work that secured buy-in and prioritisation by Heads of Department and academic colleagues. We have shown that our interventions have led to increasing awareness and activity around FAL in this ongoing process, and we have evidence of perceptions of increased knowledge of our academic staff. We suggest that central to the project success has been the power of a clear academic vision, coupled with mobilising activity around that vision, supporting colleagues to participate and adopt the change and to monitor how effectively the change has been implemented (Palmer et al., 2009). Although this paper is focused on a particular pedagogic shift toward digitally enabled FAL in a specific UK University, we suggest that its change management-based principles are relevant and adaptable to the implementation of any wider curriculum development or educational change across the disciplines of engineering education.