高等教育改革の普及を促す実効的政策の検討

――イノベーション普及論にもとづく組織形成条件の抽出――

抄録

Education Reform in universities is one of the most important issues in Japanese higher education. In spite of many policies by Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) and efforts by various universities, there is a serious problem: the absence of a clear perspective on “diffusion of educational reforms.”

Because of the shortage of revenue, most of the policies proposed by MEXT have the same pattern: MEXT supports only good practices by a limited number of universities and each of other universities follows them with their own responsibility. For example, the GP projects by MEXT aimed to improve higher education by (1) providing competitive funding for selected good educational practices and (2) making information about this public so that other universities could refer to it. However, the actual GP projects have not achieved the second goal-promoting mutual references. MEXT can provide the information, but it cannot force universities to accept such practices. It depends on the autonomy of each institution whether universities implement the reforms.

Meanwhile, diffusion of educational reforms has hardly been a topic in Japanese higher education researches. There are many studies about educational reform projects, but most of them intend “to introduce the respective practices” or “to make networks for reform by universities themselves. These research studies also presuppose the autonomy of universities. On the other hand, a few studies show that, for diffusion of educational reform the improvement of awareness in universities by external pressure is important as well as their autonomy.

The purpose of this paper is to offer a systematic model to promote the mutual reference between universities and diffusion of educational reforms. Some research in the USA has applied the theory of “diffusion of innovation” by E. M. Rogers to educational reforms. Here we focus our attention on a study by A. Kezar. Her model shows the factors within a higher education system which interconnect universities and promote innovations. This model suggests three factors for diffusion: (1) deliberation, (2) networks and (3) external support and incentives. These factors are interrelated in the whole higher education system.

Kezar's model seems to be appropriate, if we consider an additional factor which we explaining later, for a case study about Professional Science Master's (PSM), a new professional degree in the USA which certifies both scientific knowledge and real world skills, for example, communication skills, industrial management skills, and so on. The factor which Kezar did not observe is the role of industrial society. For diffusion of PSM, industrial society is very important. It advises universities to make the curriculum useful for the real world, funds the PSM programs, supports them by internships or cooperated projects, and makes some policy proposals to government.

In the present paper, we propose a new model. It has a triple-layer structure. A new organization called “buffer body” in the second layer integrates funds by industries and make their demands reasonable. In addition, there is a direct path such as the Industrial Advisor Boards in PSM between first layer―universities―and third layer―industries―. The triple-layer system assures the autonomy of higher education and enables close collaboration between industries and universities.