LEARNING INNOVATION COMPETENCES THROUGH BOUNDARY CROSSING IN A SOCIAL LEARNING ENVIRONMENT

In all areas of knowledge creation, the demand for a broader perspective is increasing. The modern world faces issues and challenges, which are becoming more and more difficult to address within the framework of a single method, be that a discipline or a profession. A boundary crossing approach for instance in problem solving, service or product creation, research or organizational team work enhances creativity, and new previously unthinkable innovations are more likely to occur.

A learning environment is most frequently understood as the physical or virtual surroundings meant and built for learning purposes. In innovation pedagogy the social aspects of working and learning are emphasized and group processes where learning happens in multidisciplinary teams form an essential part of the whole process of learning.

The aim of innovation pedagogy is to generate environments in which know-how-inspired competitive advantage can be created by combining different kinds of know-how. When utilised, this edge provides opportunities of success for the whole society. Innovation competences sharpened by innovation pedagogy are the key in introducing new competitive advantages via know-how. In a multidisciplinary environment, it is possible to evoke regional innovations and increase entrepreneurship through research and development.

In this paper we present the concept of innovation pedagogy, which was developed in Turku University of Applied Sciences, and discuss its objective to provide the students with innovation competences in order to enable them to participate in the innovation processes in their future working places and develop them. We present how innovation pedagogy can be seen as a interactive continuum between the educational organization, students, and surrounding working life and society forming a social learning environment. We believe that innovative solutions are created through social learning in diverse surroundings and discuss the nature of boundary crossing in higher education. With the term boundary crossing we go a step further in innovation development, instead of education linked multidisciplinarity, and discuss why and how to build a successful framework for boundary crossing collaboration in higher education.