Teaching and learning disrupted: isomorphic change

Abstract

Purpose

The marketplace demands a technological skillset among our college graduates, and scholars acknowledge the educational underpinnings (or lack thereof) regarding technology and its place in marketing education. The current research, therefore, aims to explore how academic institutions and programs have responded to coercive, mimetic and normative isomorphic pressures in reshaping the experiences of current marketing students.

Design/methodology/approach

To understand this pressure and its implications with regards to the marketing curriculum, this research explores the integration of technology into the marketing classroom via the three forces of institutional isomorphic change: coercive forces, mimetic processes and normative pressures. The current research uses both primary and secondary data to examine how isomorphism is occurring in digital marketing education.

Findings

We find that the integration of technology into the classroom comes from the forces of institutional isomorphic change. Although these forces are pressuring business schools to include technology in their marketing curriculum, a widespread adoption of this necessary media is yet to follow.

Research limitations/implications

From a research perspective, this paper portrays the forces that are acting to disrupt teaching and learning in the current global marketplace. Previous research tends to focus on how educators can teach a particular subject area. This paper brings together forces of change as related to educators, students and managers.

Practical implications

Educators and their educational institutions have to continue to learn to teach digital marketing. Students have a role to play in that they have to be agents of change for a stronger and newer marketing curriculum. Finally, managers need to partner with educators and students to create a stronger environment for learning practical tools.

Originality/value

Weber (2013) utilized this theoretical foundation for understanding how such pressures impacted the coverage and offering of courses addressing ethical, social and sustainability issues in graduate marketing curricula. This research within the digital marketing educational arena is the first to attempt to understand technology integration into marketing education.

Citation

Crittenden, V. and Crittenden, W.F. (2016), "Teaching and learning disrupted: isomorphic change", Journal of Research in Interactive Marketing, Vol. 10 No. 2, pp. 112-123. https://doi.org/10.1108/JRIM-12-2015-0097