What is STiP@50?
STiP@50 celebrates the unique coupling, in 1971, between the provision of Supported Open and Distance Learning as developed at the OU since 1969, with tertiary level teaching of systems thinking in the UK and beyond. 2021 marked the 50th anniversary of the founding of a new academic department – the Systems Department. Under the leadership of a newly appointed first Professor of Systems, John Beishon (1930-2001), a group of Systems thinking practitioners (STPs) collaborated to design and then present a new undergraduate module (the first of many) called Systems Behaviour (T241). Through various organisational and operational changes over that time the name, personnel and educational offerings of this group of systems practitioners have changed with the current incarnation being the ASTiP (Applied Systems Thinking in Practice) group in the School of Engineering and Innovation. The life and contribution of John Beishon to establishing the nature and scope of this systems thinking and practice is celebrated through an occasional lecture series called the John Beishon Memorial Lecture (see Summary overview of Memorial Lectures in Open University ASTiP, 2021) while a short history of OU systems thinking - Systems Thinking at the Open University: 50-year celebration (OU Systems @50) is available to download (Ison, 2021).
Reasons to be cheerful
Fifty years on, the OU has a thriving postgraduate suite of qualifications in systems thinking in practice (STiP) and extensive experience of designing and delivering STiP education and scholarship. The OU is probably the largest and most experienced provider of STiP education and scholarship in the world. Since 1971 the OU has had over 50,000 students worldwide taking a variety of systems courses, whether as stand-alone modules or as part of different UG and PG programmes of study. In 2010 ASTiP launched a specific Postgraduate suite of qualifications for STiP, with now over 1200 students having studied our core STiP modules. The ASTiP group and our PG alumni, drawing on ASTiP-led scholarship and action research initiatives from 2014, took a lead role in establishing a Trailblazing Group with the UK Institute for Apprenticeships and Technical Education (Reynolds et al., 2020). The Institute has given approval for a new occupational role and associated Level 7 (postgraduate) systems thinking practitioner apprenticeship (STPA) and the OU launches its own STPA programme in 2022.
Led by ASTiP, the Open University was able to celebrate this unique pioneering tradition of fostering STiP capabilities for lifelong learning and managing change in broad-ranging professional contexts through two initiatives in 2021; whose resources are on this STiP Hub:
a series of 8 webinar events that began in April
a series of 10 audio podcasts originally recorded in August/ September involving one-to-one conversations with ASTiP Associate, (Emeritus) Professor Simon Bell
Celebration 1: Webinar series
Starting in April 2021 ASTiP hosted a monthly series of eight hour-long lunch-time (beginning 12 noon UK time) seminars on the OU Zoom platform. The first seven events involved specially invited external expert guests from the international field. The final eighth event (7th December 2021) was given as the 4th John Beishon Memorial Lecture presented by Professor Ray Ison from ASTiP. Details of the webinars are given below.
April 27: Andrew Mitchell De Montfort University
Second-order perspectives on learning and practice under complex conditions
May 25: Glenda Eoyang, Human Systems Dynamics Institute (Minnesota, USA)
Scale-free dissemination: local behaviours to systemic results
June 22: Mike Jackson (Hull)
Systems Thinking and Practice: What has been done and what needs doing.
July 27: Sharon Pollard, Association for Water and Rural Development (AWARD) (South Africa)
Systemic praxis for water governance: Unnecessary divergence or essential framing?
September 7: Tyson Yunkaporta, Indigenous Knowledge Systems Lab (Australia)
On Being Systems within Systems
October 12: Gene Bellinger, Independent consultant (USA)
Systems thinking: trial and learning
November 9: Julian Corner, Lankelly Chase (London)
Systems thinking and social justice
December 7: Ray Ison, Open University (Australia/ Milton Keynes)
‘In search of Aha moments’ Fifty years of systemic co-designing for transformative learning with STiP.
Celebration 2: Podcast series
During the summer of 2021, 10 Systems thinking practitioners with diverse association with the ASTiP group over the past 50 years were identified and invited to have a conversation about their own experiences of using systems thinking in practice. Professor Simon Bell kindly agreed to facilitate each of the one-to-one conversations. Simon is an experienced facilitator with unique knowledge and experience of the ASTiP group coupled with a particular post-retirement interest in crafting and curating conversations for a variety of purposes aligned with STiP.
Under Simon’s stewardship, each conversation was structured around ‘systems as my background/ friend/ solace rather than “systems as my weapon” or “my way to make the world the way I want it to be”.
After all recordings were complete, each interview was edited down to between 11 and 16 minutes. Approval for the final edits were sought from each interviewee. A schedule for a staggered weekly release of each podcasts was is provided below. Individual biographies for each podcast contributor (including Simon) are given on the webpage featuring each contributor's podcast.
The podcasts (a new podcast is released weekly)
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Arwen Bailey On Using Systems Thinking In Practice
Listen now to access more details of Arwen Bailey On Using Systems Thinking In PracticeArwen Bailey speaks with Prof. Simon Bell about systems in agricultural research.
Level: 1 Introductory
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Jake Chapman On Using Systems Thinking In Practice
Listen now to access more details of Jake Chapman On Using Systems Thinking In PracticeJake Chapman speaks with Prof. Simon Bell about what a systems approach means to him and touches on the subject of active listening.
Level: 1 Introductory
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Wendy Gregory On Using Systems Thinking In Practice
Listen now to access more details of Wendy Gregory On Using Systems Thinking In PracticeWendy Gregory speaks with Prof. Simon Bell about what systems means to her and her work on green spaces.
Level: 1 Introductory
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Misha Hebel On Using Systems Thinking In Practice
Listen now to access more details of Misha Hebel On Using Systems Thinking In PracticeMisha Hebel speaks with Prof. Simon Bell about emergent properties, rich pictures, environmental challenges and the pandemic from a systems perspective.
Level: 1 Introductory
-
Martin Holt On Using Systems Thinking In Practice
Listen now to access more details of Martin Holt On Using Systems Thinking In PracticeMartin Holt speaks with Prof. Simon Bell about the way he sees the world, and about his understanding using systems approaches.
Level: 1 Introductory
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Professor John Naughton On Using Systems Thinking In Practice
Listen now to access more details of Professor John Naughton On Using Systems Thinking In PracticeProf. John Naughton, the technology columnist for The Observer, speaks with Prof. Simon Bell about systems thinking.
Level: 1 Introductory
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Rupesh Shah On Using Systems Thinking In Practice
Listen now to access more details of Rupesh Shah On Using Systems Thinking In PracticeDr. Rupesh Shah, a Staff Tutor in Engineering and Innovation at The Open University, speaks with Prof. Simon Bell about what systems means to him.
Level: 1 Introductory
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Paul Tucker On Using Systems Thinking In Practice
Listen now to access more details of Paul Tucker On Using Systems Thinking In PracticePaul Tucker speaks with Prof. Simon Bell about what systems thinking in regards to sustainability.
Level: 1 Introductory
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Peter Tuddenham On Using Systems Thinking In Practice
Listen now to access more details of Peter Tuddenham On Using Systems Thinking In PracticePeter Tuddenham speaks with Prof. Simon Bell about understanding systems behaviour.
Level: 1 Introductory
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Mo Vernon On Using Systems Thinking In Practice
Listen now to access more details of Mo Vernon On Using Systems Thinking In PracticeMo Vernon speaks with Prof. Simon Bell about using systems thinking, diagramming and rich pictures.
Level: 1 Introductory
Schedule of Podcast Releases
|
Podcast guest |
Podcast release date |
Duration |
|
Arwen Bailey |
15th December |
00:12:48 |
|
Jake Chapman |
22nd December |
00:14:13 |
|
Wendy Gregory |
5th January |
00:14:27 |
|
Misha Hebel |
12th January |
00:11:19 |
|
Martin Holt |
19th January |
00:15:42 |
|
John Naughton |
26th January |
00:16:21 |
|
Rupesh Shah |
2nd February |
00:15:55 |
|
Paul Tucker |
9th February |
00:13:18 |
|
Peter Tuddenham |
16th February |
00:12:06 |
|
Mo Vernon |
23rd February |
00:11:29 |
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