Learning with Others: Collaboration as a Pathway to College Student Success

Review\nThis ambitious, bold, and potentially controversial book argues for reframing undergraduate education as a collective enterprise, one that not only emphasizes principles of collaborative learning and collaboration generally but also asks us to shift our ideas about the purpose of a college education from one that prepares individuals to succeed to one that emphasizes communal learning that leads to societal change. Learning with Others should find a ready audience in practitioners and for use in courses on student development, curriculum, teaching and learning, and student affairs. -- Laurie A. Pohl, Boston University Wheelock College of Education & Human Development\nA bold and visionary call for a paradigmatic shift in how higher education is conceptualized in America. Conrad and Lundberg convincingly advance that this model does not serve all populations well or equally, especially in a rapidly changing world rife with 'wicked problems' that will require a coalition-of-all to solve. In a country that seems to be ridden with what-about-me-ism, a turn to collaborative problem-solving as the heart of what undergraduate education should be is refreshing. -- Brandon O. Hensley, Wayne State University, coeditor of Critical Storytelling in 2020: Issues, Elections, and Beyond\nNot surprisingly, Clif Conrad and Todd Lundberg have produced a seminal book on the intersection of collaborative learning and its efficacy at Minority-Serving Institutions. It is a genuinely major contribution to our understanding of college student success, particularly for a too-frequently-neglected demographic of institutions and students. -- Ernest Pascarella, University of Iowa, coauthor of How College Affects Students: 21st Century Evidence that Higher Education Works\nLearning with Others provides a fresh look at collaborative learning, which has been part of educational reform initiatives for the last four decades. The authors question the individualistic orientation of American higher education and its roots in colonialism and racism and suggest that we would be much better served, particularly in contributing to the public good, by moving toward more a collectivist orientation. They engage a critical perspective to collaborative learning engaging conflict and confrontation to ensure that this approach does not reinforce whiteness. And the authors underscore how racialized minority students benefit from the move to classrooms and a curriculum based around shared problem-solving, deeper connections to the local community, and active engagement as co-constructors of learning. -- Adrianna Kezar, University of Southern California, coauthor of The Gig Academy: Mapping Labor in the Neoliberal University\nLearning from Others is the book that is needed now. Now more than ever, in our society, we need students to work together, to learn from each other, and to respect and build on each other's knowledge in order to make the strongest contributions to society. Conrad and Lundburg make an important and beautifully written contribution to the literature on student success and hopefully to our practice in classrooms and in colleges and universities overall. -- Marybeth Gasman, Rutgers University, coauthor of Educating a Diverse Nation: Lessons from Minority-Serving Institutions\nLearning with Others is specifically about learning with Minority Serving Institutions (MSIs) and the students and educators within them. As the number of MSIs increases, there is a pressing need to rethink how we deliver education that centers students of color, with this book offering a transformative approach. Educators at all institutional types should embrace the educational practices offered in the book, with collaboration moving us away from an individualistic approach. -- Gina Garcia, University of Pittsburgh\nThis brilliant book advances the straight forward, but radical proposition, that collaborative, cooperative learning is superior to competitive, individual learnin