After working and serving in the education community for 42 years you find the greatest value to success in all areas is Quality, Compliance and Customer Service. Each of us must strive to each of these with great zeal. All performance outcomes with like goals must be shared from the top to all personnel with enthusiasm, commitment and dedication. The purpose of the action has noble intentions.

Dr. Carlson, thank you for your insightful comment.  Quality, Compliance and Customer Service  seem to sum up some critical guiding principles.  I am curious what guiding principles others might add and what insight others have on how exactly these principles are cultivated, demonstrated, and measured within organizations.  I look forward to more shared insights from other career college leaders!  Thank you for sharing!  

Several months ago, I read an article by Grant Wiggins entitled, "Feedback: How Learning Occurs."  (2010).  In the article, Wiggins surmised that, "Feedback is value-neutral help on worthy tasks.  it describes what the learner did and did not do in relation to her goals.  it is actionable information, and it empowers the student to make intelligent adjustments when she applies it to her next attempt to perform." This was an aha type moment for me in that it forced me to consider the difference between feedback and evaluation.  Feedback is the foundation of process improvement, whether its in the practice or administation of learning.  In essence, when institutions practice real feedback thoughout its processes, the outcome, by Wiggins definition of feedback, can only be positive.  Not only for the institution, but for the practice of education as a whole.  Compliance, then is the measure of how well the institution embraces and incorporates feedback into its culture.  So, when Tim and Amir talk about a culture of compliance, in my view they are talking about a culture of continuous feedback.  Quality.

Wiggins, G. (2010). Feedback: How Learning Occurs. Big Ideas e-journal. Retrieved on April 3, 2012, from:http://www.authenticeducation.org/ae_bigideas/article.lasso?artid=61

Dr. Patterson,

As I read your extremely insightful comments, whereas you may have had an "aha" moment, I had an "Amen" moment!  All jokes aside, your comments have contributed greatly to this discussion and I thank you for sharing and allowing us all to benefit.  

Presuming an institution's leaders embrace feedback as defined in your comments, what do you (or anyone who wishes to contribute) suppose might be the challenges to establishing effective institutional feedback loops?  How is this designed? What does that look like in practice within institutions and what are some of the ways institutions can intervene to overcome the potential challenges?  

Great discussion Dr. Patterson - thank you again for contributing your thoughts.