11 Oct Curating the Student Experience with Simulations

Posted at 11:08h in Blog, Management post, Marketing post, strategy post by

Curating the Student Experience with Simulations

Faculty choose to use a simulation for many reasons, but primarily it comes down to helping students make the connection between concept and practice. That understanding will make a difference to the employers of these students and that’s an important outcome for business school students.
But it doesn’t happen automatically. Instructors need to curate the experience for students by offering questions for reflection so that they understand the meaning of their experience with the simulation.
Bruce Gray, a former banking executive and a Penn State Behrend alumnus produced this short video to help students understand how to make meaning from their experience with our simulation, BizCafe. We thought it would be useful for other instructors to see his thoughts!
Specifically, Gray wants students to be able to articulate what they learned from their simulation experience, particularly the areas that would matter most in business. To that end he asked them to think about:

  • How did your team use the data you were given to make decisions?
  • How did you learn to make better decisions?
  • What did you learn about analyzing your position and using that to make better decisions?
  • How did you and your team reach consensus on your important decisions?

He notes that, “Experienced business executives know that what matters in business education is that students learn how to analyze, formulate strategy, and make decisions—particularly on a team.”
Our suggestion is that you take these questions and work them into your curriculum, either as a prompt for an end-of-simulation report, or a final debrief. And if you do, tell us about your experience at marketing_support@interpretive.com! We’d love to hear from you and to share your experience with other instructors.
Thank you to Bruce Gray and all the instructors at Penn State Behrend for sharing your experience!

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