Regional Networks and Ecosystem Learning

The chapter addresses homeostasis and novelty on an organizational level. The successful Dutch regional networks (in Dutch: voortgezet onderwijs–hoger onderwijs netwerken) may serve as a best practice in Europe, and are strongly supported by the Ministry of Education and the National Platform Science & Technology (Platform Bèta Techniek). The Northern Netherlands Regional Network (in Dutch: Netwerk Noord), one of eleven Dutch regional networks, covers three provinces and brings together five universities, forty schools and a number of companies, reaching out to over 5000 pupils and 300 teachers with a yearly agenda of formal and informal learning activities with a strong local identity. The Dutch network approach has grown from one of the world’s highest performing educational systems, that of the Netherlands. As the OECD stated, ‘the excellence of the Netherlands is evidenced by its strong average performance and few low performers in the Programme for International Student Assessment (PISA) the Survey of Adult Skills (PIAAC). A leading principle in the Dutch educational system is how it balances a remarkable degree of freedom at the level of schools alongside strong national accountability mechanisms. And it is this that enables new balances of homeostasis and novelty. The chapter will critically discuss how a regional collaboration developed over the last ten years and describe the overall short term, medium, and long term impacts against a theoretical backdrop provided by OECD and (the former) Noyce foundation key publications.