Building a Real World Lab

BIF launched the Student Experience Lab in 2009 with an initial phase of work focused on illuminating the college student experience and identifying opportunities to increase college-attainment levels, enhance the college student experience and improve the effectiveness of the U.S. higher education system.  Although the Lab has since initiated efforts to expand into other areas of the educational continuum, initial work in the post-secondary arena was an ideal place to start.

We embarked on this first phase of work under the premise that current U.S. post-secondary education system does not deliver, at sufficient scale or at an affordable price, a high-quality college experience that prepares all students with the skills they need to fully participate in the 21st century global economy. As a result, too many students are left with their educational and economic needs unmet.

Experience Map

The Lab’s approach is straightforward: bring the student experience to life in a way that makes the student voice more central to our conversation about transforming education. With this mission, the team created an “experience map” of the environmental and human factors that are the most significant drivers of the college student experience.  The Lab’s design researchers used observational and ethnographic research, in conjunction with secondary research drawn from the world’s best education innovators, to illustrate the experience of current, former and prospective students at various ages and from diverse racial and socioeconomic backgrounds.

Working with students at more than 40 schools from across the country, the team gathered thousands of data points related to student’s experiences with the academic, personal and financial components of the higher education system. We captured their story using video, audio, photography and narrative to shine a new light on the human, environmental and systems-level factors that have the most significant impact on student success.

The team also interviewed dozens of education experts and advocates from all sides of the debate and identified academic and scholarly research that provides important historical context to understanding the current student experience.

What did we find? Students are making decisions with tragically little information about their options or the long-term consequences of their choices. Students are maxing out on debt and uncertain how to turn their dreams into a fulfilling career. And, schools are struggling to deliver affordable services that meet demand. To educate Americans at the scale and speed that we need, we must aggressively explore and experiment with new solutions that enable more students to get the education they need.

Lab outputs from this phase of work can be viewed at http://www.businessinnovationfactory.com/sxl/

The BIF Approach

BIF’s approach enables stakeholders to see the experience through the lens of the student, better appreciate the dynamics of the whole system and more readily identify opportunities for innovation and intervention. This deep understanding of the student experience also enables BIF and its partners to identify specific elements of the experience where investment in innovation is likely to yield the greatest return.

The Lab is continuing its work in the higher education space and has initiated efforts to move into the K-12 arena.  The team is also working with advocates in the workforce development space to explore how BIF’s platform can be leveraged to support the expansion of programs that enable lifetime learning and worker retraining.

The Lab’s methodology offers a powerful tool in ongoing efforts to understand the student experience--at all grade levels--and accelerate the design and development of new solutions.

 

Next: Experimentation in Education