– We believe that by incorporating real business problems in education it will better prepare the students for working life and give them a better understanding of how their field is used in business context, says Håkon Haneberg, leader of Super-prosjektet
By Hedvig Skjelbred Svabø
Monday November 1, students, educators and businessmen came together at Super-Linked, a workshop meant to form the future of education. This night opened for a discussion on how companies can facilitate cooperation with the university for future education to help students work with relevant issues. Their goal was defined as concrete and testable suggestions from business can lay the foundation of student work in future classes and how business can take part in guidance and assessments. The night focused on innovation through new ideas meant to pave the way for future education.
The workshop was made up by different collections, with collection 1 asking how syllabus or lectures can be changed to meet the project`s goal by including business inn future classes. Collection 2 asked how exercises or exams can be changed to meet the goal to include business.
The workshop opened for interaction between different fields and helped us navigate how we can incorporate business in education so that the students will be better prepared for working life
Ingrid Berg Sivertsen, project leader and adviser at Engage
The groups worked through individual idea generation before presenting their ideas to the rest of the group. Following the presentations, they collectively settled for one idea from each collection to further develop into a complete concept to be presented before an audience at the end of the workshop. Key words for the workshop were innovation, teamwork and brainstorming all part of the entrepreneurial spirit.
Most of the presented concepts focused on how to include questions from business as part of the assessments throughout different courses including the benefits for both business and students on the matter.
It is important for us as employers to get employees that are familiar with solving business questions and the complex challenges that we meet every day.
Ulf Dahl Ryen, head of region Mid/North at TietoEVRY
One group also concluded that failing is an essential part of learning and should be included in cooperation between education and business. This is because the right answer in theory is not always the right answer in business and that other factors might be important to assess in order to find the right solution.
I feel that we as students need to learn how to fail, we learn more through failing then we do through memorizing the right answer, we need to fail more in order to learn.
Fredrik Gran Jansen, 5th year Cybernetic student.
Some classes at NTNU have already incorporated a cooperation between business and education, such as” MV3010: Forskningsoppdrag for bedrift” where media and communication students get real life issues to solve through a research assignment. Through this class the students get to know how to answer questions from business as well as business getting real challenges resolved.
I have struggled with seeing my classes in a business context, I miss the practical aspect and learning how translating it to business.
Fredrik Gran Jansen, 5th year Cybernetic student.
The interest of business for such a cooperation is that it prepares the students so that they are better equipped for working life.
It is important for us to give input to better the education in the way we currently see needed in business and that will benefit the students as future employees.
Ulf Dahl Ryen, head of region Mid/North at TietoEVRY