Transformational Learning Program Reviews

Vince commented on groups 1 & 2

Transformational Learning Program Reviews

Troy Rector

&

Vincent L. Stults

Ball State University

October 5, 2014

EDAC 634

Roles: Each of Us Reviewed a Program
(Troy - Learning-Service, New York City Community College & Vince - The Mycelium School)
Both examined and edited overall work as needed. 

Introduction

 
“In a world of change, the learners shall inherit the earth, while the learned shall find themselves perfectly suited for a world that no longer exists.” - Philosopher Eric Hoffer

This program review is focused on the simple task of evaluating programs that demonstrate the application of Transformational Learning Theory, with the purpose of understanding how transformational learning theory is applied in practice. The goal of this evaluation is to learn about and discover practices that can be applied to the development of our own groups program design.

Before examining the programs, a brief review of transformational learning theory is appropriate regarding to two fundamental elements: 1) What is transformational learning? and 2) What is the basic processes of transformational learning?

First, is a basic understanding of what transformational learning is. Simply put, the focus of transformative learning is about change. Or as Kagan (2000, p. 48) states, "dramatic, fundamental change in the way we see ourselves and the world in which we live" (cited in Merriam et al 2007, p. 130). This learning is differentiated from the common form of learning information, by in fact fundamentally changing what we know (Merriam et al 2007). So in our programs we are looking for this focus, that these programs lead learners into fundamentally changing what they know, and that the focus is not simply informational learning. More practically, we are looking at how they are doing this work. 

Second, is looking at what the process of transformorative learning is (or how we see it taking place). Mezirow identified 10 phases of transformative learning, these phases are often distilled into four critical stages: “Experience, critical reflection, rational discourse, and action” (Merriam et al 2007, p. 134).  Understanding the dynamics of each stage requires more than a surface meaning of the words, for they are embedded in a deeper theoretical understanding. Yet these simple words are useful to examine our programs for insight into their application of transformational learning theory. In looking at how they are accomplishing this focus of transformational learning, we are doing so looking for methods or practices that are facilitating this process for their learners. The hope is to identify those that can be used in our own design. 

With this simple review, we will examine our selected programs, The Mycelium School of Learning and a learning-service program for credit through New York City Community College. Then we will look at their potential application in our own transformational program development.

First is a quick note about why these programs were selected. The goal we have set for the development of our own learning program is the facilitation of transformational learning for developing effective leaders who through their transformative experience are able themselves to be change agents in their contexts. We are still refining the scope and focus of our program, but we can see potential application for leaders in businesses, entrepreneurship, religious organizations, non-profits, in civic, and in social programs including social entrepreneurship.

Program Description: The Mycelium School

While the Mycelium School's home is  in Asheville, North Carolina, the program itself is not confined to any one physical location. There are online learning components, apprenticeship opportunities, places for retreat, study, and practice that can be virtually anywhere in the world. Through their online connections, and extensive network of coaches, instructors, learning facilitators, and peer cohorts, the combination of learning environments is ever growing and changing.

Who are the Learners

To understand who the learners are that participate in the Mycelium school, one must understand the target audience of Mycelium.  There primary focus is for the many thousands of people they feel are dissatisfied with the status quo of today's worlds systems. They are targeting those who want to be change makers and "architects" of a new way of living for the future. In the initial days of their planning and start up, they believed their target group would be 18-30 year olds, but they have come to realize the need to extend the program to all adults who want this same sense of meaning and purpose in their life (Mycelium Focus Group - Instructors and Advisors, 2013). On their web site, they say that candidates fall into two categories. First, those "at a crossroads in your life, deciding which direction to go for the next stage of your journey" and second, those who are " launching a purpose-driven venture, initiative or project" (“Mycelium – Are You A Journeyer?,” n.d.). Their focus is clearly on those with an entrepreneurial spirit. The litmus for learners is a series of questions that include:

• Do you have a project you’re developing or a powerful question that is guiding you?
• Are you dedicated to learning the knowledge, skills and self-awareness that will help you do your work in the world?
• Are you eager to work and learn collaboratively?
• Are you looking for a learning experience that will support you in living the fullest you can even if it's really hard work?

(“Mycelium – Are You A Journeyer?,” n.d.).

 

Purposes and Objectives of the Program

Cofounder Mathew Abrahms in his TED Talk, sites Paulo Freire, and expresses the radical transformational focus of their work—their  desire to be an alternative school for the future (TEDxNewHaven - Matthew Abrams - 21st Century Education, 2012). The key principal to understanding the founders intent and focus of this learning school is in their name. It is a metaphor and a model to guide them. Mycelium is the vegetative element of the mushroom, "the underground root structure that links into trees and plants and is actually intelligent, so it transfers information and nutrients across the forest floor ... The power is not in the mushroom, but in the network and the connectivity from the network" (Mycelium Focus Group - Instructors and Advisors, 2013). Their question from this idea was, " how do we apply the same metaphor to education" Their mission is: "Mycelium connects people driven to ignite positive impact and creates the conditions for relevant learning and meaningful action " (“Mycelium – About Us,” n.d.). There vision is: "To cultivate learning communities of tenacious innovators creating systemic solutions that increase the health, connectivity and resilience of our world" (“Mycelium – About Us,” n.d.).

Programs Design: The Mycelium School

What if Mycelium Were to Design Education Systems?

This was the original question founders asked in designing their program. Initially they attempted to launch a nine month program in 2013, but found that to be un-feasable as a start up training program (Mycelium Focus Group - Instructors and Advisors, 2013) . Instead they implemented 12 week learning journey's and have developed several of the core program components of their future modular intensives and course add-ons. The basic design of their program is rooted in the learning journey.

Supporting The Journey

Supporting the journeys is the core of the program design. It is the network of relationships, the practices, and the activity of the journey. Like the Mycelium that tap into several root systems to support, sustain, and bring heath to all its connections, these are the nutrients ( learning experiences, connections with organizations, key people, and others in the cohort) (Mycelium Focus Group - Instructors and Advisors, 2013). This extensive network is developed through a program designed around multiple forms of learning:

·         Learning Curation Consulting (not linear learning)

·         Intensives (modules, etc)

·         Personal Coaches

·         Online and In-Person Courses

·         Online and In-Person Practice Groups

·         Peer to Peer Learning

·         Online Retreats

·         Apprenticeships ( A core component is getting out and doing)

·         Rites of Passage

(Mycelium Focus Group - Instructors and Advisors, 2013)

Overview of Entire Learning Journey

Their first focus is: Your Life Experience (learning to value what has already been learned);  Next is the need for a Guiding Question (the problem the learner wants to solve, project or life question that needs to be attended to);  followed by A Quest (focused on learning and doing in pursuing the question, and in learning how to engage in it). Culminating in the Venture Out (Taking all this back into the world) (Mycelium Focus Group - Instructors and Advisors, 2013).

Learning Facilitators are provided with the purpose to "guide you through your Journey, providing inquiries, activities and invitations that will support you in the design of your own Learning Journey" (“Mycelium – How Does It Work?,” n.d.) . Since the core focus is learning, the learner is also asked questions "to inspire self-discovery, illuminate possibilities, invite reflection" (“Mycelium – How Does It Work?,” n.d.). The goal of the activities is to help the learner "assess where you are, where you want to go, and how to activate your learning goals" (“Mycelium – How Does It Work?,” n.d.).  Learners are given opportunity to develop a "personalized learning plan, identify ways to measure... progress" and build their own Advisory Team. Throughout the journey, the learner is connected to leaders with the capacities to positively affect the world and experiences to foster personal learning and transformation (“Mycelium – How Does It Work?,” n.d.). This notion of community support is rooted in the idea of, "the wisdom of the people." The core program components of the learning journey are:

·         Six Sessions with a Dedicated Learning Coach

·         Three Hosted Retreats

·         Five Facilitated Practice Groups

·         Curated Experiences & Connections to People in the Mycelium Network

·         Personal Advisory Team

·         Menu of Workshops (Learning Catalyst)

 (“Mycelium – How Does It Work?,” n.d.).

Main Features: The Mycelium School

From the four stages of transformational learning  shared in the introduction, every one of these were touched upon by the Mycelium School. The overall steps of the learning journey that was designed sequentially  (as well as cyclically) proceed through each of the stages of  transformational learning: 1) experience=Your Life Experience; 2) critical reflection= Guiding Question; 3) rational discourse= A Quest; and 4) action=Venture Out.

There is also a dynamic of self directed learning, juxtaposed with coaching and facilitation to nurture and support this transformational process. A key component of this program is a diversity of opportunities to accomplish the same purpose, and to provide multiple styles and types of coaching, facilitation, and guides through several mediums of activity and connection. There is an implicit underlying idea of interconnectivity, with an underlying spiritual sense of nurture, healing, and growth from these connections. The metaphor and design seems to not only be constructed for individual transformation but has an overarching goal of social transformation through fostering the continued development of this connectivity beginning with the learning journey, but intended to continue over the course of the learners/co-learners lifetime.

While there are many points of intersection with transformational learning theory, there are a few differences. Some of the modules (Learning Catalysts) appear to provide traditional informational learning (even though intended to foster transformation) in both formal and informal learning opportunities. These in design are a departure from transformational learning theory but do support the overall process as designed. Many of the ideas and concepts are buzzwords, designed to invoke emotional connections and passions on the part of the participants, but do not appear to be rooted in adult educational research and without a clear connection to transformational learning theory. Although it should be noted that there is some interesting research literature using the mycelium metaphor as a part of examining transformational change, especially connected with the planetary school of thought and ecopedagogy rooted in Paulo Freire (Madjidi, 2014 & (Bussey et al., 2012). A phone call was made to the program directors of Mycelium School to ascertain if there are any intentional design connections to this research and work, but no connection was made before completing this paper.

Applications: The Mycelium School

In the program being designed for our next group project, there are several overlapping components we can see from the Mycelium School that we would like to use for our project. The first is from their learning journey with the components of self directed learning and community support.  While there is nothing new to learning journeys and self directed learning, it is the form of community support that is most appealing. Which leads us to the second practical application, The Wisdom of the People through multiple types of learning facilitators working together to guide coach, support and facilitate the transformational process: Cohort Model, Coaches, Instructors and Learning Facilitators. We see that this could be a highly beneficial component of transformational learning when coupled with other design aspects that utilize this extend network of support. We realize the complexity of scheduling, networking and inherent difficulties of their application, but believe it could be a highly beneficial component of learning.

The additional two features of the Mycelium School have useful application, but on a limited basis. The program design we are looking at would not include a full entre of instructional modules, nor are we interested in creating a sustained  lifelong connection of learning maintained through our project (though we would hope to instill the value of lifelong learning and relational connection).In Puerto Cabezas, Nicaragua, college students participate in a service learning project to earn college credits at a New York City community college.  During this international service learning opportunity the activities of students included research and surveys, as well as engagement in several educational mediums including theatrical performances designed to attend to the well-being of those living in impoverished areas of the community (Kiely 2005). During the course of their work they were required to engage in leaning activates such as journaling, reflecting together as cohorts upon the days activates , putting together a report of their findings and a final paper that outlines future direction and activities (Kiely 2005).

Description: Learning-Service, New York City Community College

 According to Kiely (2005), the transformative learning aspect involves the student’s ability to learn and understand of the levels of poverty, economic disparities, and health issues within the region as well as the different factors that contribute to it .  Social and cultural factors, structural issues, and baseline contextual factors all influence the situation that the region experiences.  The program is designed that students experience this condition for the first time and are “transformed” in the way that they view and articulate poverty.  With the region in such despair, students experience austere conditions that they’ve never experienced and they learn and are “transformed” in their views of poverty, poverty levels, and basic cultural understandings of different regions around the world.  This immersion into the cultural and poverty stricken lives “transforms” students by changing their outlook and pre-set ideas on poverty levels, factors that contribute to poverty, and how culturally, one region can be so much different than another (Kiely  2005). 

Main Features: Learning-Service, New York City Community College

Here is the programs Web Site

Learning features of this program are unique in some aspects and similar in others.  There are other service learning projects which produce the same levels of learning as well as learning concepts.  This program also has some features in which students learn due to the unique way the program is ran and operated.

The students are fully immersed into the culture of Nicaragua.  As Kiely notes in his study (2005), this immersion causes five categories of learning/ transformation to occur.  Each area has both unique concepts of learning as well as some overlap into other categories. 

Contextual border crossing is the first category that describes how transformational learning occurs in the program.  It involves the “personal, structural, historical, and program elements” of the service project.  These elements then set the stage for change within the students. (Kiely, 2002).

 

Dissonance is the second category.  It occurs due to the change in environment that the students endure.  The students have pre-set ideas and concepts of environment, culture, physical, social, political, and economic conditions.  They experience a drastic difference than what they’ve experienced before (Kiely  2005). 

 

Personalization is the third category for identifying how the students learned during the project.  From Kiely's study (2005), it is seen that as internal conflict arose within the students,  it soon became apparent in the results that this "dissonance" was internalized,  representing the nature of personalization of transformation through service-learning. Even in a short time frame, they were able to develop deep bonds with their poorer Nicaraguan friends. It is personalized—felt intrinsically. For them poverty is no longer a distant issue, but exists in friends "with names, faces and hearts" (p. 12). 

 

Processing makes up the fourth way that students learn through a transformative process.  These include, as Kiely (2005 ) lays out, logic, retrospection, interaction, and learning activities that bring insight to the participants and help them to be "self-aware of their assumptions or engaged with others to understand the origins of and solutions to social problems" (p. 13). The participant use diverse means to comprehend and process their encounters and service within Nicaragua.

 

Connecting is the fifth category which describes how transformational learning occurs during the service learning project.  Kiley (2005) describes this transformational process is the deeper emotional component which represents the glue linking them with Nicaraguans forming out of a deep understanding and empathy that creates the students commitment with the poor.  Through their action in service, students learn firsthand about Nicaraguans by "listening to Nicaraguans’ stories," and familiar exchanges. Most salient, according to Kiely (2005) is that “students in the program often attribute connections with community members to reframing their moral allegiance into greater solidarity with Nicaraguans and the global poor” (p. 14). 

Application: Learning-Service, New York City Community College

In any transformational learning programs, pre-set ideas and concepts are always present.  In order for the learning to occur, participants of the program must undergo transformation due to experiencing something different and unique to those pre-set ideas and concepts.  Other transformational learning programs should incorporate the significant and drastic changes that the students experienced with their service in Nicaragua.  A program doesn’t have to be overseas, in a different culture, or as drastic as the program reviewed but there must be a significant difference in the “before” and “after” for the student. 

 

Other aspects of the program reviewed that can be used in other transformational learning programs is the personalization attribute.  If learners/ students personalize and experience conditions and situations on an intimate, emotionally connected level, then the transformation for them is by far greater than without a significant emotional connection.  Whatever situation or event in which the learners are involved, there must be something that they can emotionally and personally bond to.  The transformational learning occurs on a greater level when the program participants “feel” something inside and “feel” themselves changing.

One additional aspect of logistic of the review program which could be used in other programs is the idea of journaling or documenting.  When the learner journals or documents, they, as well as the instructor/ teacher, can see the transformation process happen.  Both little and drastic transformations are caught in the way that learners express themselves.  Journaling, even if done through videotape, can capture emotional transformation in which everyone can witness and observe.

The service learning project in Nicaragua takes learners into an environment which is drastically different than they’ve experienced before.  They experience numerous different factors that are unique.  The learners then experience different categories that accurately describes how transformational learning occurs.  One of these is personalization and can be used by other transformational learning programs effectively.  In order to effectively use personalization in other programs, both facilitators and learns alike must create the opportunity to be personally and emotionally attached to the work or project that is enabling the learning 

Conclusion

Although each of the projects reviewed have different contexts, design elements and purposes, it is clear that each contain components foundational to the transformational learning process. 

In the Mycelium School, we have already examined the core components of the learning journey in the main features section, and seen that it was designed to directly correspond with the four critical stages of transformational learning identified my Mezirow, in a direct one to one relationship. The other components of the design (in the Mycelium Metaphor, Multiple Forms of Learning, The Wisdom of the People) echoed many core practices that have been discussed by Taylor (1998, 2008) and could provide additional resource to examine.

The learning service project on the other hand, has the clear focus on the purpose of transformational learning,  facilitating "a dramatic, fundamental change in the way we see ourselves and the world in which we live," (Merriam et la 2007) as described in our introduction, but a less direct connection to the four stage of the transformational process, though all four components are clearly represented in the five distinct transformational processes designed into the program: 1) Contextual border crossing; Dissonance; Personalization, Processing; and 5) Connecting. These too, echo many of the practices Taylor discusses (1998, 2008).

Overall each program has proven to be a trove of transformational learning treasure in its application potential for our program. In addition to the direct components of application already discussed, there are several other practices that could be examined for further insight and have demonstrated the utility and practical application needed for our next project. 

References

Bussey, M., Bjurström, Å. E., Sannum, M., Avadhuta, S., Nadhomi-Mukisa, B., Ceruto, L., … Pervyi, G. (2012). Weaving pedagogies of possibility. Learning for Sustainability in Times of Accelerating Change.

Kiely (2002). Toward an expanded conceptualization of transformational learning: A case study of international service-learning in Nicaragua. Cornell University Dissertation Abstracts International, 63 (09A), 3083.

Kiely, R. (2004). A chameleon with a complex: Searching for transformation in international service learning. Michigan Journal of Community Service Learning, 10(2), 5-20.

Kiely, R. (2005). Transformative international service learning. Academic Exchange Quarterly, 9(1), 275-281.

Madjidi, K. S. (2014, July 25). The Ecology of Transformation: A Relational Study of the Ecology of Leadership Program at the Regenerative Design Institute (Thesis).

Merriam, S. B., Caffarella, R. S., & Baumgartner, L. M. (20007). Learning in adulthood: A comprehensive guide. John Wiley & Sons.

Mycelium – About Us. (n.d.). Retrieved September 30, 2014, from http://mycelium.is/about-us/

Mycelium – Are You A Journeyer? (n.d.-a). Retrieved October 6, 2014, from http://mycelium.is/are-you-a-journeyer/

Mycelium Focus Group - Instructors and Advisors. (2013). Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3eEOr5nJaj8&feature=youtube_gdata_player

Mycelium – How Does It Work? (n.d.-a). Retrieved October 6, 2014, from http://mycelium.is/ljdetails/

Mycelium School. (n.d.). Retrieved September 30, 2014.  from http://mycelium.is/

Mycelium – The School. (n.d.). Retrieved October 2, 2014, from http://mycelium.is/school/

Taylor, E. W. (1998). The Theory and Practice of Transformative Learning: A Critical Review. Information Series No. 374.

Taylor, E. W. (2008). Transformative learning theory. New Directions for Adult and Continuing Education, 2008(119), 5–15. doi:10.1002/ace.301

TEDxNewHaven - Matthew Abrams - 21st Century Education. (2012). Retrieved from http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=YHfCdlb9T9Q&feature=youtube_gdata_player