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Impactful pedagogies in Higher Education are required to meet the challenges of the twenty-first century. This chapter outlines an inclusive, flexible, and work-based learning curriculum design framework to respond to these needs. Two cases from Glasgow Caledonian University (GCU) are used to illustrate this framework in a transnational educational context in Sub-Saharan Africa. Case one explores the impact of a Railway Operations Management program in South Africa, where the views of two cohorts of 137 recent graduates were gathered through an online questionnaire. Case two examines the views of Optometry/Orthoptics students who undertook an intensive two-week clinical work experience on the train-based clinic (Phelophepa train) in South Africa; data was gathered through an online questionnaire from 58 participating students since 2014. Both examples highlight transformative personal experiences and impacts of their education beyond just their studies – to a clearer sense of personal and professional pride, to becoming role models for their families and to developing meta-cognitive skills to support lifelong learning. In the Railway Operations Management example, additional benefits were seen to their organization – through improved interpersonal skills, decision-making, and problem-solving and creating knowledge-sharing – whereas in the Optometry/Orthoptics case life-changing impacts to patients were delivered through this work experience.

A higher educational institution evaluates the concept of success in terms of student retention, equal access to education, graduation and at times with the grade point scored by the students. It also applies for accreditation and global ranking to showcase their success rate. It is rarely seen that universities evaluate student’s success in terms of their actual learning. Some universities lay emphasis on creating a collaborative campus climate, supportive mentoring by the faculty members and at times engaging students in a participative manner as a cohort. Rarely do universities monitor the cumulative educational achievements of the students. Retention and graduating batches of students is an essential feature of a higher educational institution but is not a sufficient measure. A college degree proves to be beneficial to the student and is considered useful only when it is valued by society and helps in empowering the students. Universities need to address this issue; they need to create metrics to capture the evidence of quality learning and should try to explore approaches as to how students can broaden their horizon and knowledge base and develop their concept of social responsibility to create a sense of all round wellbeing. With the rise of liberal education, there has been a gradual phasing out of conventional classroom delivered curriculum. The curriculum has become more robust bridging the conventional with applied form of education. This book narrates case studies where academics speaks about strategic frameworks that they have implemented in their classroom based on high impact program design, as well as approaches to mentor and support students as academic program leaders. Authors have demonstrated through their chapters that high impact practice (HIP) can become effective only when it is future focused and teaches skills to students that allow them to develop their social competence and enable them to examine knowledge management with the lens of social wellbeing.