Overview of the problem

• Although most tertiary institutions design their campuses and buildings with careful consideration, some designs overlook recent scientific insights on the determinants of collaboration and performance.  Budgetary considerations also limit the capacity of institutions to design their campus optimally

 

Overview of a solution

• To address these limitations, tertiary institutions should first systematically identify spaces around the campus that are not utilized to capacity.

• Second, institutions should identify stakeholders, such as potential collaborators, that might be willing to rent this space; web scraping, algorithms, and other techniques can be applied to identify stakeholders that often need to rent space sporadically

• Third, over time, institutions should gradually collect data on the effects of various changes to the campus or other campuses—ultimately to develop a Bayesian model that can guide future decisions

• Finally, previous research on the determinants of collaboration should also bias this model

• To illustrate, indoor spaces that encourage recreational activities, such as a small movie theatre that displays informative movies, tend to facilitate collaboration and professional development.  This research, coupled with the array of other studies on this topic, could guide the prior expectations of this Bayesian model