Abstract:

Innovation projects can be powerful spearheads for pedagogical, didactic, and systemic development in the education sector, regardless of the educational level or field. Over the last few decades, the significance of these projects has become increasingly apparent, along with the growing complexity and rapid development in society.

Innovation projects in the education sector encompass a wide range of initiatives, but the overall focus is their intended impact on learners and, therefore, on the competencies of teachers, trainers, managers, and the supportiveness of the systems around. This makes an essential difference from most projects in other sectors. In education and related fields, such as guidance, in-company training or social support, projects are essentially about human behavior and human change processes - an intangible and turbulent arena to navigate.

Over the years, certain problem patterns have arisen in this context. Firstly, a lack of sustainability regarding the project results has been stated. Secondly, in some areas, a project industry seems to have distorted more genuine objectives. Thirdly, it has become clear that project-based development does not necessarily benefit educational institutions equally.

To counteract these issues, most public and commercial calls for innovation projects now come with rigid forms that aim to increase professional approaches to time management, resource allocation and promoting impact on target groups. Evaluators, engaged by call owners, apply equally rigid evaluation methods. In Denmark, these evaluation methods are rather alike, where a linear logic and intended progression with simultaneous timelines for all learners involved is used. These methods do rarely take regard to highly diverse learning processes, individual human development, and differentiated teaching.
The methods insinuate controllability and predictability that leave associations with outdated learning theories and industrial thinking. Even more, the methods appear counterproductive in daily project practice, where project members and managers must translate their work in a highly complex reality to artificial procedures and figures to match the required rational and narrow approach.

Instead, there is a need for building resilience in innovation projects. Resilience not understood as the traditional avoidance of risks, but as a “capacity of a system to absorb disturbance and reorganize while undergoing change […]” (Folke, 2016, in Ungar, 2021). Resilience is inseparable from sustainability (UN´s Global Agenda, 2018) and social capital with trust (Coleman, 1988). Trust is essential in vibrant and often disturbing projects that always depend on individual performance with engagement and creativity. Resilience can strengthen well-being (McCalman et al, 2021, in Ungar, 2021), make project members grow, perform, and drive change.

The paper explores a resilience-oriented project didactics, which has focus on authentic goals and activities, project design with agility to adapt to findings coming up during the project, and an inclusive participative approach to project members. For this purpose, some recent challenging large-scale projects are examined, mainly projects for the implementation of emerging technologies in education.

Keywords:

Innovation projects, project management, resilience, trust, agility, change management.