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At the request of program leaders at universities that are adapting and implementing CDIO, we offer this startup advice. It captures and distills lessons learned by the initial CDIO collaborators. The advice is targeted to individuals or small teams leading the academic reform, although it may also prove helpful for faculty members and other academic leaders (e.g., deans).

The advice below is organized loosely into topical areas (Goals/Outcomes, etc.) and then into individual bits of advice, with the key work or phrase highlighted. Five of the items are commonly thought to be key in bringing about any organizational change: rationale, committed leadership, interested early adopters, appeal to professionalism, and resources and incentives. These should be very carefully considered and incorporated into program plans.
The attention of program leaders is also drawn to the companion document “Early Successes” which outlines activities that can lead to early visible progress toward CDIO adaptation and implementation.

Goals/outcomes

Define a clear and easily absorbed rationale for starting the program, and the benefits. Create a sense of urgency for reform. Frame the process as improvement (vs. “fixing things”). Motivate by references external to the university: what will enhance student recruitment, what industry wants, what accrediter are calling for, what other universities are doing, what other departments are doing.

Set clear and agreed upon objectives, outcomes and metrics for change.

• Include some early goals so there can be small victories along the way.
• The CDIO Syllabus will define desired outcomes for graduating students. However, the outcomes of the reform initiatives are broader than these. Ask yourself why you are making changes, what needs to be changed, and what results will be worth all the efforts and resources.

Consult the CDIO Syllabus and decide on desired proficiency levels for student skills. Consider modifications of your program goals in case they are not compatible with this. Communicate this to your teaching staff.

Give specific examples of what has been done, even what has worked and why, so that people see concrete items, things that they can start with.

Embrace the principle that CDIO is the appropriate context of engineering education (CDIO Standard #1) before moving onto more detailed program implementation.

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Leaders/early adopters/followers

Committed leadership is essential for successful reform. Ideally the leader of the effort should be the department head or program director, that is, the real owner of the program. There should also be strong support from other leaders (e.g., the dean).

Start with a small group of interested and motivated early adopters. Make sure you have the "best" teachers with you. These leaders should set the example for others.

• Actively court opinion leaders and early adopters and propel them into a position where they can lead the charge.
• Provide support for projects and experiments of those who want to try new approaches. Free up some time for these people. Recognize teaching staff for their efforts and publicize their successes. Encourage each adopter to involve at least one other person.
• Make sure enough relevant stakeholders are involved as part of the initial team, that is, that the team has the power to be able to make the changes (and making sure there are not people who will work to block the project).

But, at the same time, initiate a discussion and engagement among the larger teaching staff and students, to get them involved.

• Involve as many teaching staff as possible in some CDIO-related activity, for example, writing of learning objectives, participation in the development of new courses, education for teaching staff.
• Introduce the CDIO-concept slowly. Do not expect your teaching staff to immediately give you a standing ovation. Be prepared to adjust your own opinions along the opinions of "rioting" teaching staff in order not to create unnecessary conflicts.
• Involve a cross section, not just junior or senior teaching staff.
• Use benchmarking as a way of engaging and educating teaching staff.
• Obtain buy-in from a substantial portion of the teaching staff; to do this requires education of teaching staff and a consensus building process.

Leadership should be inclusive, so that after this project is finished all those involved should be able both to sustain the CDIO ideas and to lead new educational initiatives themselves. Involve several persons in a central coordinating team. A dean/program director, a few academics (spread in age), the learning designer, a student, an administrator, etc. This is where all the work is coordinated.

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Planning and Motivating Change

Create an overall blueprint or roadmap of where different projects might fit.

• Make a project plan with clear and realistic deadlines and share it with everyone involved, assign responsibilities and resources.

Setup a suitable project organization.

• Form working groups with group leaders. Assign specific tasks and set a deadline to report.
• Invite numerous academics to participate in the creation and critique of the work.
• Be concrete, create project groups and make project plans.
• Establish routines for practical/routine tasks like document handling.

Appeal to professionalism. Frame the project in terms of a professional engineering endeavor. Follow the process from needs to goals to prototypes, take data, and evaluate, etc.

Start small, think big. Six teaching staff tried one technique in one course to get an early success and good reviews, which made it difficult to argue against doing more.

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Students

Involve students early in the process.

• Use student groups for input and advice, support, communications and debate among students.
• Have students identify teachers' best practices, and identify what they (the students) like about workspaces.
• Involve students directly on the program committees reviewing reform, and give them real substantive tasks.

Enthusiastic students with high expectations are very good motivation for teaching staff to change their practices.

Be certain that that reform is applied to least one program year per year, so that the expectations of the students continue to be met.

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Curriculum

Analyze your curriculum and your assessment methods to see if they support your goals. Use the CDIO Syllabus to assess whether you have the right courses, right length and depth, best sequence etc.

• Benchmark current courses to encourage teaching staff and demonstrate how much already exists; no need for them to start from zero.

In designing the curriculum, it is not necessary, or even desirable, to change all courses.

• Try to find a structured highway through all the courses from beginning to end that will allow the CDIO Syllabus skills to be acquired, will be under the control of the program and sustainable.
• It is sometimes easier to create one or two new courses instead of modifying exisiting ones.

Try to make smaller curriculum modifications as soon as possible. This shows that something is happening and that you are trying to get where you want.

Introduce a design-build experience in an early 1st year course.

• This will not only demonstrate that change has now begun, but it will hopefully also enhance student motivation in later years and a drive for further change.
• Pick some enthusiastic teaching staff, and let them run a design-build experience that you could use in all sorts of marketing. That is not only towards teaching staff and students, but also towards financing bodies.
• Make sure to plan for a rather ambitious content, it is always easier to reduce the demands than to increase them when you are in the middle of a course.

Plan for an extra month of work after the first time the course has been given, you always need to change things and it is better to do it right after the course has finished than just before next time it will be given.

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Workspaces

Analyze your current workspaces, how they are used, the equipment and staff involved. Often it is not necessary to build or even rebuild workspaces, but simple to re-task them, to envision a new pattern of usage that supports system building and social modes of learning, along with more traditional usages of reinforcing disciplinary learning.

Designing workspaces based on requirements, needs, desires, etc. of future users (students, teaching staff) is an important part of the workspace development processes. Document, coordinate, circulate, key documents to get different perspectives, points of view, areas of emphasis, etc.

Engineering students and teaching teaching staff have high expectations for CDIO workspaces: computers, IT support, computer application programs, equipment, and projects. It's a prudent measure to be prepared to meet these customer-driven desires.

Having workspaces available for student use during off-hours (nights and weekends) is a big morale-booster, as well as productivity enhancer, for students. This has to be balanced against workplace safety and traning needs, of course.

Preparing for CDIO hands-on projects requires pre-planning work, in addition to the tasks required to actually carry out the projects. Be prepared for this, especially for first-time projects.

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Teaching and learning

Changing the teaching style of faculty is a slow process. Many faculty consider this a private domain, and will even resist discussions. Start early, carefully, and continue effort in this area.

Start with investigation of teaching practices. Because teaching staff love to talk about their subject and they start reflecting about what they are doing which many times makes them think that this couldn't be the only way of teaching.

Run an early learning objectives-workshop. A lot of teaching staff then started to realize what was going on, and their previous activities sometimes appeared to be not as "good" as the new stuff.

After a learning objectives workshop, start with formulating new learning objectives. Fight over these until there is agreement and decision. Then develop learning activities (teaching) and assessment to fulfill objectives. Collect and circulate your own examples of learning objectives, comparing those written before and after this process.

Plan the courses so that you can be sure that all students are active. Also, make sure that the teachers think not only about the goals of the course but also about the road the students take to reach those goals.

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Assessment and evaluation

Take baseline measures of students’ levels of proficiency in CDIO skills at the start. Conduct a few data gathering efforts with teaching staff, students, and other stakeholders to determine knowledge, skills, and attitudes before you make any changes.

Start by analyzing your current program evaluation methods, used for accreditation or internal review. Make sure your evaluation techniques and methods support your goals. Build on it to improve it, and learn from the information already contained in previous reviews and evaluations. Avoid the temptation to create another, completely new program evaluation system.

Take frequent measures, revise plans based on data, and communicate the program evaluation process to everyone in the program. Evaluate efforts and results at least twice a year. Use data to improve processes and revise changes. Be sure that everyone is informed of decisions. Encourage wide participation, and don't let negative attitudes hinder a forward momentum.

Evaluate where you are now in relation to your current program goals. Use exit polls for students and polls to employers of recent graduates and relate the results to the goals.

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Communication

Communicate regularly with all involved; especially about early successes.

• Inform teaching staff about the ideas behind CDIO and the plans for the particular program.
• Respond quickly to problems.

It is essential to give detailed information and detailed instructions when you start up a new course, this applies both to your contacts with students and to contacts with other teachers involved in the course. Everybody is not as familiar as you are with the CDIO ideas.

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Support

Provide resources and incentives for teaching staff to make changes. Recognize teaching staff for their efforts and publicize their successes.

Do not plan to do this on the margin. Rather, plan specifically to stop doing other things to enable a focus on this.

Plan to support and educate the staff. Don't lecture to people on how to do things and then expect change to happen by itself. The best way to develop your staff is to have someone work with them. Then they will do it and learn at the same time!
Used the collaborative style in the workshops for creating "learning objectives and so forth.

Try also to practice CDIO ideas like active learning, hands on when doing workshops with teaching staff.

PLace a learning development person on the team with sufficient time to actively work with the teachers on the development. Make sure they make development a priority. You may think that the people from your university's Teaching & Learning unit are of the wrong sort, but have you ever really invited them to dance before?

Convince university leaders of need for program and support. Get commitment from deans and university leaders for resources, and to identify a permanent source of resources.

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