CEWIL Resource Hub: Applied Research Project at the University of Toronto Scarborough

This project is a partnership between The BRIDGE — a multi-purpose academic space that spans teaching, study, research, and experiential learning for business, finance, and entrepreneurship — and a luxury automotive manufacturer (the client). The BRIDGE project team divided the client's complex problem across five courses in the Bachelor of Business Administration (BBA) to align with the individual course learning outcomes.

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Key success factors

  • The BRIDGE team works to align the deliverables with the learning outcomes in each course.
  • Throughout the project, students receive mentorship and guidance as needed from the course’s instructor, as well as feedback and coaching from the industry partner.   

Unique characteristics

  • As a reflection of the workplace, the project is designed to involve many instances of interdisciplinary collaboration between five courses, so students learn to communicate amongst different audiences and within teams of different disciplinary focus.

Challenges

  • In the first week of the project, the client's head office withdrew permission to have their name explicitly in the case. The BRIDGE team had to quickly pivot and anonymize the information across all the courses. This took creative effort, but did not change the learning outcomes or delivery of solutions. The company was still involved and seems open to making themselves visible in future collaborations based on the success of the first offering.
  • This project involved several stakeholders, so there were issues around data sharing. A system was put in place to provide clarity around what information would be shared, how it would be shared, and how it would be used in the classroom to meet each stakeholder's level of sensitivity.

Key characteristics

  • Type: Applied Research Project
  • Year program was established: 2019
  • Number of students per year: 322 across 5 courses 
  • Number of employers/partners per year: 1 for first iteration 
  • Programs/academic disciplines participating: Management 
  • Duration of experience: 2 academic terms (8 months) 
  • Submitted by: Dave Fenton