Phase 3: Optimizing

During phase 3, the focus is on optimizing every students’ learning process by capitalizing on different perspectives. During the previous phases, the stage has been set, and measures have been taken to create and reinforce a safe and inclusive learning climate. Students have reflected on their own frame of reference, and are aware of the assumptions underlying them (phase 1). They have practiced interacting with perspectives different from their own (phase 2). In phase 3, students actively share their perspectives, and unique and differing perspectives are invited, encouraged and offered, and student engage with them in enriching ways. By actively combining and integrating perspectives in phase 3, the added value of differences among students, provided that the interaction around these differences is guided well and continually, is acknowledged and leads to more creativity in the area of problem solving (Nakui, Paulus & Van der Zee, 2009).

Furthermore, not only interacting with other perspectives but actively switching between them helps students display more cognitive flexibility when performing tasks that demand higher thinking levels (Hong et al, 2000; Benet-Martinez et al, 2006). Interventions during this stage are now explicitly focused on reaching the formulated learning goals for learning in diversity, as well as learning from diversity (Radstake, 2017). Although these learning goals can be assessed during all three phases, formatively as well as summatively, in phase 3 summative assessment is an expected part of the programme. This does not mean that by reaching this phase, the strategies used for phase 1 and 2 cease to be of importance. Some strategies, especially those that stimulate a safe and inclusive learning environment, require a permanent focus.

By focusing on different academic (content) perspectives instead of solely personal perspectives, in this phase students learn to see the relevance of diversity for their academic skills. Following phase 2, this phase further strengthens their academic integration. In addition, the strategies in this phase support the Dublin Descriptor/Framework for Qualifications of European Higher Education 3: “To have the ability to gather and interpret relevant data (usually within their field of study) to inform judgements that include reflection on relevant social, scientific or ethical issues” on BA level, and to “have the ability to integrate knowledge and handle complexity, and formulate judgements with incomplete or limited information, but that include reflecting on social and ethical responsibilities linked to the application of their knowledge and judgements” on MA level (Bologna Working Group (2005).


Learning goals phase 3:

  • Students can switch between different perspectives
  • Students can integrate and combine perspectives when analysing problems or cases
  • Students can combine different perspectives to formulate creative solutions on an individual and on group level.


Teacher testimonials:

“I ask my third-year students to find peer reviewed articles that have different perspectives than what we are reading in our class in Religious studies. This helps them putting the texts we are reading in the syllabus in context. It also helps me confront the blind spots that I have myself after doing research in this field for years. I do notice that it confuses the students a bit sometimes. They ask why this is part of the course, and in the class-evaluation some of them mention this exercise as unnecessary.”


“At the moment, my students in Biomedical science work on lab-projects in groups of six. They speak their minds during group discussions, and although it may sometimes get quite intense, we usually find a way to navigate difficult conversations. Their discussions are usually about how they are working together, and what they are expecting from each other. This works to a certain extent. However, I think that we are missing an opportunity for them to deepen their learning. It would be great if they could not only work well together, but also learn from each other’s work methods.”