Occasional Occasional
Paper Paper
Series Series
Volume 2015
Number 34
Constructivists Online: Reimagining
Progressive Practice
Article 8
October 2015
Operations Management Outside of the Classroom: An Operations Management Outside of the Classroom: An
Experiential Approach to Teaching Enabled by Online Learning Experiential Approach to Teaching Enabled by Online Learning
Kristen A. Sosulski
New York University
Harry G. Chernoff
New York University
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Recommended Citation Recommended Citation
Sosulski, K. A., & Chernoff, H. G. (2015). Operations Management Outside of the Classroom: An
Experiential Approach to Teaching Enabled by Online Learning.
Occasional Paper Series, 2015
(34). DOI:
https://doi.org/10.58295/2375-3668.1006
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96 | Bank Street College of Education
Operations Management Outside of the
Classroom: An Experiential Approach to
Teaching Enabled by Online Learning
Kristen A. Sosulski & Harry G. Chernoff
This paper describes the design of an experiential approach to teaching operations management (OM)
at New York University Stern School of Business. OM students study the design and management of
the supply side of business, including how products are produced and how services are supplied. The
course discussed in this paper is unique in that students learn operations while visiting real companies
and organizations. The foundational concepts are not taught in classroom lectures, but through video
minilectures, demonstrations, group work sessions, and practice problems that are available online
and can be accessed at any time. This allows for classroom time to be spent interacting with OM lead-
ers in companies throughout NYC. The city becomes the classroom, and students witness the OM
processes of real companies through direct onsite observation and discussions with eld experts and
professionals as well as with their own peers. This approach was inspired and informed by a desire to
have students gain experiential interactions with OM professionals and simultaneously learn theoret-
ical models and constructs.
In order to provide an experiential learning course in OM, we needed to completely redesign the
onsite course. To realize our vision of learning through experience and observation, we developed
online lessons to ground students in the foundational knowledge of the eld. The online lessons were
designed as weekly modules that included readings, a series of minilectures, an individual assignment,
and a group assignment. This structure helped the students develop a theoretical understanding prior
to applying their knowledge in real-world contexts, which changed our roles from lecturers to facili-
tators. The redesign shifted the ownership of the learning from the instructors to the students, who
became active participants at the center of the learning.
It was the use of the online learning modules that made this experiential course possible. Using online
lessons enabled us to conceptualize the classroom experience and create an authentic learning expe-
rience that provided students with opportunities to construct their own understanding of OM by (a)
experiencing it in context, (b) engaging in authentic practices within a community of peers (i.e., their
classmates), experts (i.e., the course faculty members), and professionals (i.e., business executives in
OM roles), and (c) developing a rich understanding of the subject and its relevance to every business.
Literature Review
Constructivist learning theory posits that students construct their own understanding and knowledge
(Brown, Collins, & Duguid, 1989; Papert, 1993; Piaget, 1954; Piaget & Garcia, 1991). The focus is
Occasional Paper Series, October 2015 | 97
on the process by which knowledge is constructed by the learner rather than on knowledge acqui-
sition (Fosnot, 1996; Jonassen, 1992; Lajoie, 1993). Fundamental to constructivist approaches are
“context-rich experience-based activities” (Jonassen, 1992, p. 138). These activities involve attention
to the social context and culture in which the learning takes place, the support for the development
of knowledge construction, and the opportunities for active learner engagement through authentic
practice. The design of both the online and the onsite learning environment for the course needed to
support students in this approach, and digital learning resources had to be developed that supported
constructivist principles.
The course design followed a learner-centered framework. Learner-centered design (Soloway, Guzdi-
al, & Hay, 1994) focuses on providing students with the necessary scaffolding (Vygotsky, 1978) to help
them develop from novices into experts. The online activities in our course also gave students the
necessary scaffolding to support the active construction of knowledge, which was further supported
through immersion in authentic activities or work (Quintana, Shin, Norris, & Soloway, 2006). Part of
the students’ weekly online assignment was to address real and current problems that the companies
they visited were facing. Students worked in teams on these site-visit challenges to identify alternative
solutions and then had the opportunity to discuss their recommendations with the company execu-
tives. Situating cognition or learning this way enables learners to see knowledge and its application in
context (Greeno, 2006). Specically, the executives shared insights and the realities of their business
that inuenced how their companies actually solved these problems.
Discourse is also important to the learning process. Through exposure to professionals in the eld,
students can “learn (and practice) professional discourse” (Quintana, Shin, Norris, & Soloway, 2006,
p. 123). To help learners develop and rene their understandings of the knowledge they are acquiring,
it is crucial for them to discuss their ideas and questions with each other and with industry profes-
sionals. Finally, students need exposure to the relevant community (e.g., the OM divisions of compa-
nies) to understand the culture and environment in which the concepts and principles they learn are
applied in the eld.
Course Redesign
The newly designed section of the OM course embodied the principles of experiential learning, au-
thentic practice, and attention to the social context that support a constructivist approach to learning.
The context was the real-world business setting. The OM business practices of a company—the ways
products are produced and/or services are supplied—were observed in the eld. Moreover, the on-
line lessons involved collaborative activities that mirrored the challenges faced by the business being
studied. The social context involved the community of OM professionals, the class of students, and a
group of OM faculty members who participated in scaffolding students in their learning, online and
in the eld.
The course was given the title Ops in NYC: An Experiential Section of Operations Management.
98 | Bank Street College of Education
Operations Management Outside of the Classroom: An Experiential Approach to Teaching Enabled by Online Learning
It was launched in the spring of 2014 for full-time, rst-year MBA students and was cotaught by the
authors. Between us, we have experience in education, OM, and business.
The Idea
In March 2013 we developed the idea for the course redesign during a lunch conversation with some
of our students who were enrolled in an elective course we coteach, Operations in Panama. In it, we
take a group of 25 MBA students to Panama to study the Panama Canal, how business is conducted
in Panama, small business entrepreneurship, and real estate development. The students expressed
great enthusiasm for this course and reected on the value of learning on location and hearing from
industry experts from inside their workplace. We asked the students to comment on their experience
in the prerequisite course, Operations Management. They described the course’s content as engaging,
but saw it as a missed opportunity to learn more about businesses in NYC. Given that we witnessed
such success in the site visits in the Operations in Panama course, we considered whether it would
be possible to also take students out of the classroom and into NYC for the OM core course. On the
university’s website, it states that “NYU, in keeping with its founder’s vision, is ‘in and of the city’: the
University—which has no walls and no gates—is deeply intertwined with New York City, drawing in-
spiration from its vitality” (New York University, n.d., para 3). We wondered whether we could realize
this mission by using NYC as our classroom. We knew we needed to teach the foundational content
of such a core course and realized that it would be a challenge without regular classroom meetings.
However, having had previous experience with online education, we thought it could be possible to
teach the necessary content in an online format. Online learning is a viable way to enable students to
self-prepare for the learning that takes place in the eld.
Solidifying the Course Vision
During the summer and fall of 2013, we worked intensively on the course redesign. Our vision for
the course was to use NYC as the platform for learning; class time was to be spent at various busi-
nesses. The types of businesses and organizations selected were organized around ve themes that we
felt represented NYC: food, fashion, nance, real estate, and transportation. Each site visit focused
on fundamental topics in OM, including process design and analysis, waiting lines, scheduling, in-
ventory, quality, supply chains, operational risk, project management, simulation, and optimization
techniques. The nine site visits ranged from a shipping container terminal to an educational farm, all
within the NYC area.
Course Components
As we progressed in our planning, we identied several features of this course that went beyond the
traditional OM class: (a) nine online lessons that included the foundational content and collaborative
online challenges designed to prepare students for the site visits and (b) nine visits to companies and
organizations.
Occasional Paper Series, October 2015 | 99
Online lessons. Given the strong emphasis on learning in the eld, a series of sequential online ac-
tivities were designed to support foundational learning and concepts. Online lessons in OM, each
of which included three faculty-led videos that ranged from one to seven minutes, were part of the
learning environment. These videos helped to strengthen students’ understanding of foundational
concepts as well as their ability to make OM decisions through accompanying practice exercises. The
video sequence followed a simple format: (a) a brief introduction to the topic, (b) a problem-solution
demonstration; and (c) an assignment: a challenge related to the topic. The assignments served as the
weekly formative assessment. The rst video (in Figure 1) is an overview of an OM topic, inventory
and inventory models. The second video (in Figure 2) is a problem and solution demonstration by
an OM faculty member. The third video (in Figure 3) introduces an individual practice exercise for
students to solve based on the second video. Students submitted their work online to the instructors
who provided feedback on these assignments to help students rene and improve their work.
The principles of multimedia learning (Mayer, 2001) were applied to the design of the lesson and
the videos that comprised it, which were created using animation and narration rather than the typ-
ical talking-head format. The introductory and problem-solution demonstration videos were each
between ve and seven minutes. The assignment video was about one minute. Figure 4 shows the
content of a weekly lesson.
Each of the online video lessons was created and led by a different OM faculty member. Inviting other
OM faculty to participate in developing content for the course helped us achieve two important goals.
First, it served to extend the community of experts beyond the course faculty. We thought this would
be a way to highlight and leverage the expertise of the OM faculty at NYU Stern. Second, including
others in the course design enabled us to begin a dialogue with our OM colleagues concerning the
new course format and to facilitate a culture of collaboration and experimentation in teaching. Our
vision was to incorporate an experiential element into every OM core course at NYU Stern.
The online lessons were intended to enable students to study foundational concepts and models
Video 1. Introduction to
inventory management
by Professor Srikanth
Jagabathula (New York
University, 2014b). The
video is available at: h t t p://
youtu.be/kGPr9oeN0MQ
Video 2. Problem-solution
demonstration by Professor
Jagabathula (New York
University, 2014c). The
video is available at: h t t p://
youtu.be/JCt1IVSjsuM
Video 3. Introduction by
Professor Jagabathula to a
practice exercise for students
to solve based on the video
referenced in Figure 2. (New
York University, 2014a).
The video is available at:
http://youtu.be/pIOzdftXsXc
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Operations Management Outside of the Classroom: An Experiential Approach to Teaching Enabled by Online Learning
online; to work in teams on real business challenges; and to observe those concepts, models, and
business challenges on location at a different rm each week. In the course evaluation, many students
commented that the online minilectures had been very helpful, although some students indicated that
they wished that additional resources had been provided. Out of the 11 students who responded to
the postcourse survey, 90% indicated that they had found the online video lectures and problems at
least somewhat important for developing their knowledge of OM, with 72% indicating that the lec-
tures and problems were important or extremely important in that regard. Furthermore, 72% of the
respondents indicated that they found the online lessons at least somewhat important for developing
their skills in operations consulting, with 54% indicating that the lessons were important or extremely
important for that.
In the eld, students observed the operational techniques, processes, and strategies employed in a va-
Figure 4. A weekly online lesson for Ops in NYC.
Occasional Paper Series, October 2015 | 101
riety of contexts. For example, during one site visit, they learned how a retail store used two different
types of inventory models, both of which they had studied and discussed during the weekly online
lesson.
Preparation for the site visits. In preparation for each week’s site visit, students worked in teams of four
to complete an online challenge that typically included a brief case study and questions that helped
them analyze the challenges faced by the rm and guided them in their exploration, observations,
and questioning during the site visit. (See Figure 5 for an example of a pre-site-visit group challenge.)
To ensure that the students’ time on site was used effectively, prior to the site visit students were also
required to identify their learning objectives and then develop questions for the industry experts that
were designed to ensure the attainment of those objectives.
Site visits. Our initial thought was that every class would be on location. We agreed to hold three in-
class sessions to orient students, followed by nine sessions out in the eld. The sites visited included
JetBlue, Whole Foods, the NYC Taxi and Limousine Commission, and FreshDirect. To emphasize
that students were active participants in the learning process, we set the expectation that they were
to approach each site visit in the role of an OM consultant, fully cognizant of the major challenges
facing the business, rather than as a “tourist” who expected to be shown the interesting aspects of
the business.
The visits to companies and organizations involved a presentation by a company executive and a
Figure 5. A weekly online lesson for Ops in NYC.
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Operations Management Outside of the Classroom: An Experiential Approach to Teaching Enabled by Online Learning
discussion with the decision makers, a tour of the plant or ofce facilities, and a question and answer
session. The quality of the students’ questions was evidence of the efcacy of our approach to the
preparation for the site visits. The student’s role during the site visit was to observe the operational
processes and participate in the discussion with industry experts. Through observation, students
developed an understanding of how the different models and operational strategies were employed.
Results & Renements
In the traditional classroom-based OM course, it was difcult for students to experience operations
in context and impossible for them to engage in discourse with the OM community of experts and
practitioners beyond their peers and their professor. In the redesigned course, the online video lessons
presented students with expert voices from OM faculty, while the site visits presented viewpoints of
practitioners and industry leaders.
The interest level in OM increased with the new experiential format. The course was fully enrolled
and had a waiting list, which is rare for classes in this subject at NYU Stern. They also demonstrated
evidence of being able to transfer OM concepts from one context to another through their experienc-
es during the various site visits; although a different aspect of OM was addressed at each site, it was
clear that students could see that all aspects of OM studied in the course were present during every
site visit. The in-class midterm exercise also provided evidence that students could identify and reect
on all operational topics covered in the course and successfully transfer their knowledge of OM from
one business setting to another. In addition, the operations consulting project at Sylvester Manor Ed-
ucational Farm provided an opportunity for students to apply their learning from the course to a set
of ill-structured problems—i.e., those that tend not to have one denitive or correct solution—and
accordingly apply their collective knowledge in identifying a set of solutions and alternatives in oper-
ational decision-making and strategy for the organization.
Reecting on the class, several students expressed their preference for learning in an authentic re-
al-world setting. One student commented:
I’m a hands-on learner…This class was perfect for my learning style.
As a future brand manager, I’ll be overseeing so many parts of the
process, from advertising and marketing to operations and supply
chain management. This class showed me how operations ts within
the larger business. Having been on an in-depth visit to Maher
Container Terminal, I now have a better understanding of why goods
take a certain amount of time to ship, for example…The complexity of
coordinating dierent departments in a company, as well as running
an eective assembly line, became real and relatable to me. (NYU Stern,
2014, para. 3)
Occasional Paper Series, October 2015 | 103
Another student said:
I took this class because I wanted to see operations from more of
a strategic aspect…In this class, we took the theory and put it into
practice in the real world…This class oered a rare opportunity to
hear rst-hand from senior executives, who actually spent up to three
hours of their time with us. We didn’t get all the answers from them; we
learned to think more broadly and ask the right questions. (NYU Stern,
2014, para. 4–5)
Students had two options for the nal course assessment. The rst, which more than 85% of the
students selected, was to individually pursue further study of new OM topics through addition-
al online lessons that we provided. The second, which fewer than 15% of the students selected,
was to synthesize their previous learning throughout the course. This suggests that most stu-
dents were condent and comfortable learning OM concepts on their own after the course and
that they used the nal assessment as a way to continue their learning. This course redesign af-
forded students the opportunity to construct their own understanding of OM and challenge
that understanding by interacting with faculty experts, OM executives, and their peers. A ma-
jor contribution of this course was its participation in the development of business profession-
als who see their role not just as individual practitioners, but as members of a larger community.
Business education at the graduate and undergraduate levels has been slow to adopt constructivist
practices. This course redesign demonstrates an approach to professional education that can extend
into many disciplines within a business school and beyond. It is well known that online learning is
often implemented at institutions of higher learning as a way to reach new student populations and
to offer students exibility in their schedules. However, Ops in NYC provided an alternative lens
through which to view online learning. The course was exclusive, taken by only 25 full-time MBA
students. The online portion of the class was not in that format for purposes of convenience; it was
essential for this type of experiential course. Without online learning, it would be difcult to give stu-
dents a real-world experience and also provide them with the necessary scaffolding to learn the foun-
dational concepts. In this course redesign, we presented a pedagogical reason for online education.
We saw an opportunity to transform the lecture-style format of a core course into a live, interactive
learning experience within a community of industry experts, faculty, practitioners, and peers.
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Occasional Paper Series, October 2015 | 105
Kristen Sosulski is an associate professor of information, operations, and management sciences at
New York University’s Stern School of Business and the current director for the Stern Center for
Innovation in Teaching and Learning. Professor Sosulski received her doctorate in communications,
computing, and technology in education from Columbia University and her BS from NYU Stern
School of Business in information systems. She teaches MBA and executive courses in data visualiza-
tion, R programming, and operations management. Professor Sosulski is the coauthor of Essentials of
Online Course Design: A Standards-Based Guide and The Savvy Student’s Guide to Online Learn-
ing. ››› ks123@nyu.edu
Harry G. Chernoff is clinical professor of operations management at NYU Stern School of Business,
where he has been a member of the faculty for over 30 years. Professor Chernoff teaches in the full-
time MBA program, the part-time Langone program and numerous Executive MBA programs. He
is the academic director of the NYU Master of Science in Business Analytics program. He has also
taught in international programs at business schools and private industry training centers around the
world. ››› hchernof@stern.nyu.edu
Sosulski, K., Chernoff, H. (2015). Operations management outside of the classroom: an expe-
riential approach to teaching enabled by online learning. Bank Street Occasional Paper Series 34.
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