Maximizing Campus Impact

» Case Study 2

Bowling Green State University Takes Advantage of Student Resources by Creating Hot Groups
An insight into the potential of student work in the areas of research and development results in a unique learning opportunity for students. Here is the story, as told by the Digital Media Research Group at Bowling Green State University

The Situation
Students are often asked to do repetitive and mundane work while attending our universities; yet without intellectual challenges, we cannot recruit the best and brightest to our institutions. A university that cannot engage their students will not retain them long. We saw a need to create learning environments that are compelling and exciting and that open the doors to intellectual curiosity. BGSU relies on the potential of engaged student learners in research and development. New media centers offer the perfect environment to spawn something magic: The Hot Group.

The Action Taken

A hot group is what the name implies: a lively, high-achieving, dedicated group, usually small, whose members are turned on to an exciting and challenging task. Hot groups, while they last, completely captivate their members, occupying their hearts and minds to the exclusion of almost everything else. They do great things fast.
– Harold J. Leavitt and Jean Lipman-Blumen, Hot Groups (Oxford University Press: 2001)

We were very fortunate at BGSU to have a large program of nearly 500 majors in Visual Communication Technology, all of whom are required to complete three full semesters of paid co-op work. In addition we had created an exclusive service learning experience for the very brightest freshmen called the Digital Magicians. This was open to about 5% of our freshmen based on a portfolio review and on interviews by upperclassman managers. After a full semester of real-world experience, these students were again selectively invited to interview with the Digital Media Research Group.

The students in the Digital Media Research Group come from different disciplines including visual communication technology, computer science, and art. Perhaps the overriding characteristic is their instinct for solving ill-defined problems as a group. They are often asked to work, with little or no guidance, on problems for which the path to success is only vaguely visible. What has evolved is a group that pumps out astonishing ideas, debates passionately, and works beyond expectations.

The Effect on Campus
Sustaining projects that span multiple years presents a challenge to an all-student work group. We have solved this to a great degree by hiring students in overlapping semesters. Students have continued to work beyond the required co-op period as well. Having students working 20 hours per week and attending classes at odd hours of the day presents additional challenges in communication. From the start we have used a progress seminar each week to report from every student as to the challenges they face. Having everyone informed about everyone else's work has been part of the success of the DMRG.

The DMRG for the past year has been actively working with scholars from music, art, computer science, and electronics technology to create a new synergy on the BGSU campus. Already research projects and thesis work are being generated because of our student groups. This has led to additional funding and even new space for our efforts.

Tips for Other Centers
We are seeing New Media Hot Groups emerging in both industry and universities. The power of engaging students in this enterprise cannot be overlooked. They are the key to accomplishing far more than we ever could without them.

The greatest resource a university has is the intellectual power residing in members of the learning community. Media groups are a perfect environment to unleash the intellectual power of our students for research and development.

If you would like to start your own Hot Group, keep in mind:

• Hot groups can be diverse in almost all things - except standards of thinking.
• Members of hot groups exercise their whole brains, actively and continuously.
• Hot groups like their own physical space.