This exploratory research investigates students' responses to innovative instructional methods, focusing primarily on identifying the barriers that discourage students from engaging with methods that are new or not expected. The instructional methods explored are examples of learning-centered teaching and assessment methods, and are considered to be innovative since they are not yet widely used in higher education. To investigate this issue, literature from organizational change management, resistance to change, and higher education is reviewed. Gaps from the higher education literature suggest that no comprehensive framework or model exists regarding students' barriers to engaging with innovative, learning-centered instructional methods. This research attempts to address these gaps. Case study methodology was selected to enable a detailed study of a course that employs innovative instructional methods. Modified grounded theory approach was used to inform both research instrument design and data analysis. Students' barriers fall into eight key themes. Relevant factors include: the students' year of study, amount of instructional variety, the academic discipline, culture of the innovative course, and alignments/misalignments between students' and instructors' perceptions of barriers to change.