Innovating to transform the future of learning together
Nearly 300 students, faculty and staff spent a day collaborating and generating ideas at the Learning Innovation and Research Convening on October 28 at the McNamara Alumni Center on the Twin Cities campus.
A key component of the Elevate Extraordinary 2030 strategic roadmap, the Learning Innovation and Research Convening is a visionary first step toward bridging the gap between what learning research shows and how higher education is practiced. Throughout the day, participants representing all five campuses dissected what is working, what could be better and what is possible for the future of learning at the University of Minnesota and beyond.
“We're bringing together the scholars and experts who can redesign learning with integrity based on evidence to generate greater success for our current and future students,” said Lori Carrell, chancellor at the University of Minnesota Rochester.
A day of dreaming big
Student engagement was an integral part of the convening and will continue to be central as the University executes one of the strategic imperatives: innovate to transform the future of learning. At the convening, five students shared their journeys in and out of the classroom — from challenges to radical wishes — to provide a foundation for the day’s activities.
All participants then spent the day in small groups sketching and pitching new ideas, programs, initiatives or degrees to address key challenges, including personalization at scale, accelerated pathways, lifelong and flexible learning and applied problem-solving for the common good.
While inspired to dream big, all ideas were informed by student challenges and evidence-based research, with the potential to scale.
In partnership with the Rochester campus, the day’s conversations were facilitated by Future Design School, a consultancy rooted in education transformation.
“Future Design School has been a valued partner to many educators including the University of Minnesota Rochester,” said Carrell. “Their commitment to human-centered design and future-focused thinking was the perfect match for the vision of this convening: to approach complex challenges with curiosity, creativity and purpose."
The day concluded with University researchers presenting their current learning research to spark ideas for future programs to be created through the newly announced Learning Innovation and Student Success Accelerator.
Fast-paced solutions
The Learning Innovation and Student Success Accelerator is a new design activator with three key elements: a Learning Research Collaborative that informs the design of new learning models and measures their effectiveness; a Pilot Pitch Lab where potential ideas are shared; and a Pilot Design Studio where prototypes of selected pitches are created.
Students will serve as co-designers throughout the process, alongside learning scholars and employers, to design programs with workforce competencies, deep learning and belonging in mind.
“We are unaware of any other public university system in the country that has prioritized this kind of learning innovation, has students as co-designers and will take its guidance from research about how students learn and develop,” said Carrell.
The Learning Innovation and Student Success Accelerator is funded through Elevate Extraordinary 2030 with $3 million over three years. It will be a University-wide endeavor, supported by a five-campus advisory team, facilitators, student design fellows, an executive director and more.
The Learning Design Studio to generate pilot programs will take place in August 2027 on the Rochester campus — which specializes in learning research, multi-disciplinary education and evidence-based practice.
“Our long-term aspiration is to become a national resource on learning innovation with the development of new evidence-based models,” said Gretchen Ritter, executive vice president and provost.
More information about the accelerator will be announced later this year, with pilots launching in fall 2028.
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