Studying a BBA Degree Via Running Your Own Business
at TAMK ProAcademy
Jukka Siltanen
Team coach
ITK '09 conference:
2 focuses
Innovative learning 
methods in higher education
Online tools that they don't want you to use
Adapted from Nonaka, Ikujiro & Takeuchi, Hirotaka. 1995. The Knowledge-Creating Company.
Knowledge creation process
Learning at ProAcademy
Values
Sustainability
Every hour logged
100 % different study plan
Financial
Social
Environmental
Jukka Siltanen
Team coach, M.Sc.
ProAcademy
TAMK University of Applied Sciences

Email   jukka.siltanen@tamk.fi
Mobile  +358 40 801 6403
Web     http://www.proakatemia.fi
ProAcademy at TAMK University of Applied Sciences is a special unit in entrepreneurship studies for Business and Business Information Systems degree students. We have completely left behind teaching in the form of lectures, assignments and exams in favor of team and student-centered learning tools such as knowledge-creation and innovation sessions, learning cells, portfolios, development discussions, seminars, essays written for a learning need and customer projects. In the beginning of their second year of studies students form cooperative companies in teams of 15-20 people and all learning is integrated into developing the ProAcademy community, the team company and the students themselves. Instead of classrooms we have offices and team session rooms. Teachers have been trained to become team coaches and they motivate, challenge and support the students. Coaches' main task is to create an encouraging environment for learning. 

Our approach enables us to use learning-by-doing philosophy throughout in a long-term and goal-oriented process where the journey is often more important than the destination. Students have great freedom and responsibility in setting themselves meaningful learning goals. We develop, follow and reflect these goals in development discussions and using Ian Cunningham's learning agreement as a tool. Peter Senge's and Nonaka and Takeuchi's theories about learning organizations and the social nature of knowledge also have a strong influence on our learning tools. The model as a whole is closely related to Team Academy at Jyväskylä University of Applied Sciences, which was the first unit of this kind.

Study credits are generated from the hours students spend in different learning settings, working on projects and reading books. Students log the hours into their personal electronic study plan. When enough hours have accumulated into particular categories, the coach marks study modules completed in the study register. Evaluation is a continuous process as there are no courses or modules that have specific starting and ending dates. We collect customer feedback from completed projects via an electronic form in additional to verbal feedback. Every year teams complete a peer-evaluation on the development of the team members' working life skills and the development of ProAcademy as a learning environment. As part of this students also evaluate the performance of their coach in developing the team and the individuals. Projects and innovation sessions are evaluated using the Motorola model which helps to reflect on what went well, what can be improved next time, what was learned and what is taken into practice from the learning results.

ProAcademy does not use online learning environments in the traditional sense because we believe that the strength of the community comes from being and working together. Experiences, feelings and gestures are important in knowledge-creation and innovation sessions and those are difficult to convey online. Personality is an important part of success and we want everyone to be able to express him or herself fully. Instead of online learning environments our students use and develop tools from the working life based on their needs. We have our own intranet for sharing information and external webpages created by the students to market ProAcademy for new students and prospective clients. We use blogs to share our insights, Google Calendars and Docs to share our timetables and documents and Facebook for marketing events the teams are organizing. Online services are used flexibly based on the needs of the situation.

ProAcademy has been using this learning environment and these learning tools for almost 10 years now and we want to share our experiences on how they have transformed both our students and our faculty. The outcomes of empowering students to take full responsibility of the direction of their own personal and professional development coupled with becoming an entrepreneur in the process are simply astounding. Students gain true competences from working daily with clients and partner shareholders. What are competences generated by exams if the student has never tested them in practice?

Once you've tried what true team learning is like, there's no going back to traditional learning environments!
Learning tools
Individual
Team
Company
Community
Dialogue
Innovation sessions
Birth-giving
Feedback circles
Team building
Learning contract
Motorolas
Motorolas
Performance reviews
Portfolio
Reading and essays
Personal 
coaching
Learning cells
Workshops
Seminars
ProAcademy days
Client projects
Customer feedback
Sales, customer acquisition and networking
Product development
Innovation challenges
100 students
9 graduated teams
10 years in operation
Over 20 % continue 
as entrepreneurs
Nonaka & Takeuchi
Kolb
Wenger
Vygotski
Toyota
Motorola
More information on our learning methods:
http://jukkasiltanen.pp.fi/laurea/Lbd_paper_Siltanen.pdf
(cc) *betenoir*
Humap tools
Moodle
dotProject.net
Senge
Ian Cunningham
Online learning part-time evangelist...
...who lost faith.
Didn't believe in social media in education...
...too old to be part of the first wave.
Shadow IT system
We are training entrepreneurs with cloud computing skills!
Tools supporting learning organization need to be allowed evolve!
Thank you!