College of Business Research

Educators are continuously concerned with developing innovative and effective teaching methodology to increase student learning and engagement. This study is designed to assess the effectiveness of an innovative instructional methodology, using a TV series to teach and develop leadership understanding, skills and knowledge.

During a semester long class on leadership, students were taught abstract leadership concepts and theories using Episodes from the Star Trek Series. We used inductive reasoning methodology, watching an episode of Star Trek and then developing leadership theory, and deductive reasoning methodology, learning about a leadership theory and then analyzing the theory using an episode of Star Trek, to develop leadership understanding, skills and knowledge. Student journal entries, questionnaires on student engagement and learning, and end of course evaluations were used to assess the effectiveness of the teaching methodology. Results support our expectation that student learning and engagement can be enhanced using the effective application of TV episodes.