Date of Submission

8-9-2021

Document Type

DiP

Degree

Doctor of Education

Department

Education

Keywords

not-for-profit engineering organization, higher education institutions, engineering schools, student society, collaboration, leadership approaches

Abstract

This organizational improvement plan (OIP) proposes a change process to foster collaboration between a not-for-profit engineering organization and higher education institutions (HEIs) situated in the Central Ontario Region. This OIP will help students create successful conditions to transition from HEIs to workplaces by providing them with support from a multidisciplinary team, including professional engineers. Support will be needed to engage students in events that underscore creativity, critical thinking, communication, and other leadership competencies for facing 21st-century challenges. As a section chair, I will work as a change initiator/participant with a guiding coalition encompassing students, faculty members, HEI administrators, and executives from the engineering organization to create a sustainable change solution. This OIP uses the principles of adaptive, humble, and distributive leadership approaches. The leadership framework drives the implementation plan, which focuses on developing a student-run society that will create and promote activities to help students transition from HEIs to workplaces. The solution presented offers a way of ensuring financial support and management methods to increase stakeholder accountability and engagement. Lessons learned from the change process will be shared with engineering associations and HEIs across Canada. The report demonstrates how the implementation plan and the adopted change model and leadership approaches are woven into monitoring and evaluation methods grounded on a continuous and open communication system. This OIP may be adapted to similar contexts in which chapters of professional associations and engineering schools have the common goal of enhancing student engagement with the local community.

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