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  • Learning from the Military

    By Joshua Kim November 16, 2009 9:33 pm EST

    I just finished an excellent book called The Fourth Star: Four Generals and the Epic Struggle for the Future of the United States Army. I believe that the experience of the generals profiled in this book can teach us in academia a great deal about how the culture of large and tradition bound institutions can be transformed.

    In order to effectively fight in Iraq these generals, particularly David Patraeus, needed to reverse the deeply held traditional Army doctrine of force protection and overwhelming kinetic warfare. In its place, Petraeus was able to instill counter-insurgency tactics that emphasized protecting the population and co-opting former insurgents to create the security necessary to build institutions.

    As a learning technologist working for a private college I have very little contact with military people and institutions. I know little about the armed forces academies and colleges, beyond that they have a reputation for extreme academic rigor and are known for producing some of our highest quality postsecondary graduates.

    I have no idea how the armed forces utilize learning technology in their institutions of higher learning. I have an inkling that a great number of active duty personnel and veterans utilize online learning, but I have never worked directly with this population.

    I've come to believe that my ignorance about our military is a problem. Beyond the embarrassing fact that I don't personally know anybody who has served and sacrificed in our nation's wars over the past 6 years, and have a poor understanding of military educational institutions, I think that I am missing an opportunity to learn about cultures and how they transform themselves.

    In higher education we are engaged in a cultural shift. One that puts the learner at the center of the construction and delivery of education, a process that is catalyzed by technology. We are living through a transition from a scarcity of educational materials and knowledge to an abundance. We are working to redesign our institutions, programs and courses to meet the needs of a new set learners, as well as to open up higher education to groups that have traditionally been closed out.

    How can we make connections and build relationships with members of our military who also work in education? At EDUCAUSE I did not see any presentations by people from armed forces academies or institutions (did I miss them?). I'm not sure how to make these connections. How can we learn from the larger experience of transformation in the military to help us manage our own transformations?

    Below are 4 books that I read in the past couple years on the U.S. military. Any recommendations for other books would be appreciated.

    • The Gamble: General David Petraeus and the American Military Adventure in Iraq, 2006-2008
    • Fiasco: The American Military Adventure in Iraq
    • Hog Pilots, Blue Water Grunts: The American Military in the Air, at Sea, and on the Ground
    • Imperial Grunts: On the Ground with the American Military, from Mongolia to the Philippines to Iraq and Beyond
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Comments on Learning from the Military

  • Models to respect
  • Posted by Ross Miller , Senior Director of Assessment at Berkeley College on November 17, 2009 at 8:30am EST

  • When I worked at AAC&U, we were fortunate to work with individuals both from the US Air Force Academy and from West Point. Their highly intentional approaches to education were both imaginative and inspiring. From cutting edge faculty development, to comprehensive assessment of student learning, to diffucult work on the hardest to define outcomes such as ethics and leadership, these academies provided educational leadership to all who were able to listen to their presentations at various AAC&U meetings.

    My particular favorite feature of the USAFA curriculum is a 90+ hour general education core!

     

  • Suggested title
  • Posted by Phred on November 17, 2009 at 11:00am EST

  • I am currently reading Ethical leadership in turbulent times : modeling the public career of George C. Marshall by Gerald M. Pops (Lexington Books, 2009) and would suggest that. Pops emphasizes Marshall as an ethical leader, a notion that corporations, the military, and (not least) universities, could benefit from. Marshall's grasp of the civilian-military dynamic was one of the best in the history of this country, and he made major contributions to the way the army learned and thought.

  • Military in education in a big way
  • Posted by Paula , Graduate medical education on November 17, 2009 at 11:45am EST

  • I have been impressed by the military presence at education venues I have attended. At the AAMC conference a couple of years ago, several people from West Point with an organization psychologist presented their project on guiding growth of professionalism. They studied cadets up through generals. One text they referred to was Kegan's In Over Our Heads, a theory of adult development as an "open-ended process born of the dynamic interaction of cultural demands and emerging mental capabilities" (I quote from the back-cover blurb) I understood that the goal of this project was improve the development of professionalism across a career.

    At Simulation meetings, the military is present in a big way. The impression I have received is of commitment to a continuously learning organization, and supporting outcome-oriented training and skills development, at all levels from how to use a walkie-talkie (made-up for-instance) to thoughtfully changing a culture (or individuals' response to culture).

    At a brief introduction to Blackboard that I attended at my institution, one of the leaders had completed an on-line certificate in on-line education design from U Wisconsin that she characterized as demanding. "Of course, the military guys were always done early." she commented and paused. "There were a lot of military guys in the course, in fact. I was kind of surprised."

    Joshua, if you get a chance, check out the International Simulation in Health Care meeting.

  • Posted by Mike Burke on November 17, 2009 at 3:00pm EST

  • I'm a retired Army officer who teaches English full-time at a community college. I'm pleased to see you regard the services as places where transformation can occur. Most folks look at us from the outside and think we're pretty much inadaptable, but we aren't--sometimes. The four generals The Fourth Star profiles could not have accomplished what they did were it not for the Army's learning from its defeat in Viet Nam. I'd suggest you read James Kitfield's 1997 book Prodigal Soldiers, about how a handful of generals reinvented the army of the 1970s into the force that won the first Gulf War so handily (I was commissioned in 1973, and my first soldiers were draftees; I served in an armored division in the Gulf War, and retired after teaching English at West Point in 2000).

    I'm amazed at the many similarities between military institutions and academic ones. I found most military decisions are made by consensus, not by simple orders, that committee work is how most policy decisions are made, and that working with people inside a uniform or out is remarkably the same. But what's missing in the academic world, in my experience, is the kind of frequent review and analysis of performance that I was used to. We don't as a rule examine department or program status in a useful way--focusing on FTEs and budget and student numbers are all of very limited utility, but they really aren't helpful. In the Army, I noticed that bad commanders focused on the wrong numbers, and asked the wrong questions. Good commanders asked better questions. I hope that more academic administrators learn to do the same.

  • thank you for all the amazing suggestions and ideas
  • Posted by Joshua Kim at Dartmouth College on November 17, 2009 at 8:30pm EST

  • Mike, Paula, Ross and "Phred": Quick note to say thank you for the great suggestions for follow-up and further reading.

    Taken together all your postings have an enormous amount to think about and act on. I'm writing down all the materials and books you mentioned, as well as the other opportunities discussed.

    Mike...I'd really like to hear more about your thoughts on this issue - are you writing about these issues anywhere I can access?

    Paula...I'd like to learn more about the work you are involved with in simulations in health care.

    Josh

  • working with our armed forces through education
  • Posted by Jessica at American Military University on November 19, 2009 at 8:45am EST

  • Hi, I work at American Military University, and each day we have the honor and privilege of interacting with many of our 45,000 men and women who are serving their country. And each day, I’m continuously impressed with their dedication to the pursuit of learning and advancing their education. I would be delighted to connect you to some of our students, or at least direct you to our web site (www.apu.apus.edu)... Or even our Facebook page: http://www.facebook.com/group.php?gid=2234334925

  • e-learning in the military
  • Posted by Dr Henk Eijkman , Academic Learning and Teaching Fellow at Australian Defence Force Academy on November 24, 2009 at 5:30am EST

  • Interesting article and observations Joshua. I think you are right about what we can learn from the military - and vice versa. For that purpose we have started the Defence Academies and Colleges e-Learning (DACeL) conferences. We had our first (and highly successful) conference in Stellenbosch earlier this year and our next conference is in The Hague in the Netherlands 21-23 April 2010 - see url below. To promote dialogue we do not have parallel sessions. While it limits the number of presentations we have participants actually discussing papers with each other so the quality of the interaction is great. (http://www.dacel.com.au/page2.htm). You might like to come along!

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