Hello! And welcome to our new and improved Innovator Network. What is the Innovator Network? In short, it’s a collective of individuals, universities and employers committed to student-centered academic transformation.

We (the Education Design Lab) are curating and hosting the Innovator Network, but we want it to be shaped and guided largely by its members (you).We plan to start conversations here that build from our design challenges with universities, employers and entrepreneurs.

So, what does that look like exactly? We’ll send out periodic updates that will serve both as conversation starters andhopefully helpful insights from our design work and research, and impressive people we meet along the way. We’ll also have opportunities for Innovator Network members to develop new ideas, share challenges, questions, ideas and stories with each other during live exchanges. Our hope is that each update catalyzes thoughtful discussion and connections in the comments.

Updates will mostly fall under one of the following categories:

» Innovation Story | A story from a university, entrepreneur, organization, disruptor, etc. on how they’ve successfully leveraged innovation to improve higher education for students.

» Article of Note | Any article that we think is of interest to you (usually revolving around subjects like innovation, design thinking, education transformation, useful trends in higher ed funding, learning, the future of work). We’ll focus on highlighting articles from sources that aren’t already on your reading list.

» From the Lab | Updates, requests and discussion starters from the Education Design Lab. These will include things like higher ed design questions, updates about our ongoing design challenges or facilitation sessions that could be relevant to your work.

We’ve heard over and over from various players in academic transformation that they either lack a place to connect with and learn from fellow innovators, or they lack the proven tools and insights needed to accomplish the transformation they’re striving for. The Innovator Network is our attempt at creating a community that can fill that space.

Most importantly, we want the Innovator Network to reflect its members. So we ask you now:

What topics in higher ed redesign would you like to discuss with fellow innovators?

How might a network of higher ed innovators serve you best?

We hope you’ll join us.

We hope you’ll join us.