Simulating the global workplace for graduate employability

Higher education institutions increasingly recognise the need to develop both disciplinary knowledge and soft skills to foster the employability of their graduates. For students in International Studies programmes, the workplace opportunities to develop soft skills relevant to their intended professions are scarce, costly and unavailable to many. This paper argues that universities can harness the power of ICTs in ways that students find engaging and offer opportunities to gain professional experience that prepares them for an international workplace. We describe a new work-integrated learning model that embeds a multi-layered in-person simulation within an academic context. Facilitated by cross-national pedagogical collaboration, students participate live in cross-campus experiential learning with online peers. Students’ reflections on the model indicate that this model can foster a range of generic soft skills that enable them to apply their academic knowledge, collaborate with a culturally diverse group and work in a digital world. To refine this blended learning model, more attention needs to be paid to designing appropriate evaluation tools and harnessing cultural diversity more effectively.     

Identifying the trends and impact of graduate attributes on employability: a literature review

Graduate employability has become an issue since there are broad mismatches between the acquired graduate skills from university and the required skills by employers. While previous researches have outlined the salient skills that need to be embedded in graduate education, to date no studies have attempted to methodically identify and synthesize the literature on graduate attributes. In this paper a total of 39 relevant studies on graduate skills and attributes in the subject areas of business and management, accounting, and computer science were extracted from Scopus^® (database). This revealed a total of 53 graduate attributes, with some being highly used, such as communication, teamwork, problem solving, technological skills, creativity, interpersonal skills, leadership skills, self-management and flexibility/adaptability. The majority of studies used a quantitative survey method to collect and rank graduate attributes, and Australia emerged as the most active country in researching the domain.     

Getting in,getting on: fragility in student and graduate identity

ABSTRACT

Over a period of three years this longitudinal study explored new approaches to consider student identity during the transition from university to employment. Students were followed through a new portfolio-based final year course and beyond university into the workplace. With universities increasingly recognising the employment aspirations of their students, facilitating self-awareness of graduate attributes and the development of employability skills are becoming integral to the higher education proposition; however the impact of employability initiatives is not well understood. The aim of the study was to examine changes in self-identification through the development of a portfolio of work using Holmes’ Claim Affirmation Model of Emergent Identity as the conceptual framework. Data were collected through student questionnaires and graduate interviews. The study uncovered the ways in which role models, developmental networks, and imaginings of a possible self were used in identity work. A fragile reconstruction of identity was observed as graduates faced the labour market, with this fragility continuing to be experienced while navigating an uncertain work landscape. We used these findings to allow us to refine Holmes’ Model by (a) adding a dynamic element and (b) grounding it on longitudinal data.     

Business graduate employability – where are we going wrong?

Persistent gaps in certain non-technical skills in business graduates continue to impact on organisational performance and global competitiveness. Despite business schools' best efforts in developing non-technical skills, widely acknowledged as fundamental to graduate employability, there has been considerably less attention to measuring skill outcomes and even less on their subsequent transfer to the workplace. It appears stakeholders are assuming transfer occurs automatically in graduates, neglecting the influence of learning program, learner and workplace characteristics on this complex process and its potential impact on graduate employability. This paper unpacks the concept of transfer and proposes a model of graduate employability that incorporates the process. Measures for empirical analysis are discussed. Testing the model would indicate the extent to which transfer occurs and highlight collaborative strategies for employers, universities and graduates in nurturing learning and workplace environments in which transfer may flourish, taking us one step closer to the elusive ‘work-ready’ graduate.     

Curriculum mapping to embed graduate capabilities

Graduate capabilities are an essential aspect of undergraduate development in higher education. Accordingly, La Trobe University's Design for learning has identified particular university-wide graduate capabilities and required all faculties to explicitly embed these in their curricula. The Faculty of Law and Management developed an approach to map the teaching and assessment of eight graduate capabilities across the first year of the faculty's degree programmes, allowing staff to evaluate the embedding of graduate capabilities and identifying where they might further develop their curricula. This article describes a process designed to collect, analyse and present data on current teaching and assessment of graduate capabilities. The discursive approach supports reflective practice in curriculum design while the resulting heat maps provide diagrammatic accounts of current practices and indicators of where redesign of curriculum should centre.     

Strategic institutional approaches to graduate employability: navigating meanings,measurements and what really matters

ABSTRACT

Despite ongoing efforts by universities, challenges and tensions continue to exist in academic discourse, policy and practice around graduate employability. These factors can militate against the sector’s capacity to prepare learners for life and work, because they promote unclear, and sometimes counterproductive and competing, courses of action. This article suggests that higher education institutions’ approaches to graduate employability reflect at least three aims. The aims relate to: (i) short-term graduate outcomes; (ii) professional readiness; and (iii) living and working productively and meaningfully across the lifespan. The commitment to each of these aims is often tacit and ill-defined and varies within as well as between institutions, and over time. This article attempts to navigate a productive path through the multiple aims and agendas, along with the definitional and measurement challenges, to identify, workable approaches. It suggests some actionable principles to enhance employability that address the tensions between the three employability aims.     

Competing voices: a Figured Worlds approach to theorising graduate perspectives on career success

ABSTRACT

Becoming a university graduate has long been considered the route to individual occupational and social mobility, while educating more citizens has been assumed to add to a nation’s human capital and competitiveness. University education has come to be associated with individual and societal aspiration. However, changes in the labour market associated with globalisation, technology, and fears of graduate underemployment have served to question this. This paper seeks to uncover the meaning that individuals construct about their early careers as they navigate such uncertain contexts. It reports on a study based on the graduate population of one university in England. Analysis tests the value of Figured Worlds theory. Using the construct of ‘self-authoring’, this paper identifies competing voices around employability and career success. Findings reveal how graduates orchestrate varied voices, in order to find ways to figure their experience and what it means to be a successful graduate.     

篮球技能学习初期两侧性运动迁移的实验研究

采用教学实验法探讨两侧性迁移对篮球运动技能学习产生的影响.结果表明,篮球运动技能学习初期存在着两侧性迁移;并且在篮球行进间技能的教学过程中,采用"两侧性运动迁移"的练习方法,可以加快学生技能学习的进程,促进学生两侧肢体技能的平衡发展.     

构建合理的研究生教育课程体系

从我国现行研究生教育课程体系的特点及面临的问题来看,构建合理的研究生教育课程体系,应确立以下原则性框架:重视课程设置在体系上的相对完整性;突出课程设置的前沿性;明确课程设置体系的层次性;强调课程设置体系的个性化。     

Evaluating the impact of reflecting on curriculum-embedded skill development: the experience of science undergraduates

ABSTRACT

Meaningful reflection on their learning and skill development is often lacking in the experience of undergraduates. Many students do not recognise the curriculum-embedded development of transferable skills and lack the ability to articulate such skills. This mixed-methods study sought to investigate whether engaging students in reflection would increase their ability to recognise and articulate their skill development. Sixty science undergraduates from Monash University completed a voluntary semester-long program recording and reflecting on course-related skill development, supported by email prompts and group discussions. The impact of students’ involvement was evaluated through pre- and post-participation surveys, reflections and group discussions. Most students were challenged by the unfamiliarity of thinking beyond knowledge attainment in order to identify and reflect on skill-related experiences. However, they recognised a range of benefits from doing so, including an improved ability to recognise their skill development, strengths and weaknesses and to articulate their skills in readiness for seeking employment. They also valued previously unappreciated learning tasks and gained motivation to improve skill deficits and seek out opportunities to improve their employability. Based on this study, recommendations are made regarding best practice for implementing skills reflection in the curriculum.     

Ivory-tower or market-oriented enterprise: the role of higher education institutions in shaping graduate employability in the domain of science

This article researches higher education (HE) managers’ perception of graduate professional success and higher education institutions’ (HEI) activity aimed at enhancing graduate employability. The issue is worth examining not only because of growing relative unemployment rates among HE graduates but also because it is a part of a heated discussion on the contemporary evolution of HEIs. We analysed 36 semi-structured interviews with representatives of HEIs offering studies in the field of science in six countries (Austria, Germany, Italy, Poland, Slovenia and Turkey). Our analysis showed that there are three approaches observed, depending to a large extent on the balance between different HE stakeholders within subdomains (triple-helix theory). Our results support the hypothesis of diversification of HEIs’ models varying from the traditional ivory-tower-type university (with a dominating role of academic oligarchy) to the market-oriented educational enterprise (where the business sector is a key driver of change).     

Discrepant stakeholder perspectives on graduate employability strategies

A literature review identified 12 strategies that have been empirically linked to improvements in graduate employability. A survey methodology was used to investigate self-reported use and/or perspectives on these strategies among four stakeholder groups. The following questions were asked: to students – What strategies are you using to improve your graduate employability; to graduates – What strategies did you use to improve your employability?; to higher education career development professionals and educators – Which of the following employability strategies do you provide for students?; and to employers – Which of the following strategies undertaken by students does your organisation value when recruiting graduates? Across the four stakeholder groups, 705 responses were received and analysed. The key findings were discrepancies between the strategies reported in the literature and those indicated in the surveys, as well as discrepancies between stakeholder groups in regard to which strategies were indicated.     

Major influences on the teaching and assessment of graduate attributes

Efforts to systematically integrate graduate attributes across university curricula have relied on academic staff acceptance and ability to translate top-down policy into teaching practice. The literature and anecdotal reports over the past two decades show limited success in the area using this approach. Why is this so? Teaching staff across 16 Australian universities were surveyed, as part of an Australian Learning and Teaching Council-funded grant, regarding their beliefs about graduate attributes and their willingness and confidence to teach and assess them. The study found that although 73% of academic staff surveyed believed graduate attributes were important, there was a substantial difference between beliefs and actual emphasis reported in practice. We consider the major influences on the teaching and assessment of graduate attributes, the implications for policy development and implementation, and propose a rethink in relation to how to work towards improved graduate attribute outcomes in universities.     

论创业型大学研究生培养的定位

针对福州大学最近提出的创业型大学的发展战略,结合作者在研究生培养和管理中的一些经验,提出了一些创业型大学中研究生培养定位的建议．     

Educational development for responsible graduate students in the neoliberal university

In this article, we examine how our work in educational development, specifically in graduate student training, enacts the logic of neoliberalism in higher education in Canada. We approach this examination through a collaborative autoethnographic consideration of and reflection on our practices and experiences as educational developers, the design and delivery of a graduate student survey and our own experiences of and identification with ‘self-actualizing graduate students’. Further, we illustrate how neoliberalism shapes the work of teaching and learning centres resulting in offering programming, which compels graduate students to act in ways that can be read as responsible and capable of navigating an increasingly bleak academic labour market. Throughout the article we call attention to the ways in which our role as educational developers may either reinforce or disrupt neoliberal discourses. While we urge a critical approach, we also reflect on constraints to such criticism.     

When academics integrate research skill development in the curriculum

This study considered outcomes when 27 academics explicitly developed and assessed student research skills in 28 regular (non-research methods) semester-length courses. These courses ranged from small (n?=?17) to medium-large (n = 222) and included those from first year to masters in business, engineering, health science, humanities and science, across five universities in three Australian cities. The two-year study used three data sets to determine the outcomes of development and assessment initiatives: student pre- (n?=?779) and post-questionnaires (n?=?601), interviews with students (n?=?46) one year after completing a course that developed research skills and interviews with academics (n?=?17) involved in developing and assessing student research skills. These multiple sources provided evidence that students developed a variety of discipline-specific research skills and that these skills were useful for subsequent studies and especially for employment. Academics indicated that the process of making explicit the development of student research skills led to enhancement of their teaching, helping the academics to clarify major course purposes as well as enabling them to provide more substantial feedback to students than in the past. Academics also indicated that this teaching process changed their understanding of disciplinary research and, for some, even suggested new directions in their research.     

调整课程结构：提高大学生就业能力的关键——评《高校课程结构调整与大学生就业问题研究》

汪霞教授等撰写的《高校课程结构调整与大学生就业问题研究》一书从＂课程结构＂的角度出发,深入探讨了大学生就业与课程结构的关系,论证了大学课程结构对大学生＂可雇佣性＂的影响,开拓新的就业空间与调整课程结构的关系,职业领域人才需求的变化及其对高校人才培养、课程结构调整的要求。基于研究,提出毕业生就业与高校课程结构调整的战略思路。     

高等农业院校研究生生物化学实验教学改革与思考

结合学校实际情况从教学条件、教学内容、教学方式、教学考核、师资等方面阐述了生物化学实验教学如何与生命科学的发展相适应,改革硕士研究生生物化学实验教学方法.     

Graduate transition into work: the bridging role of graduate placement programmes in the small- and medium-sized enterprise workplace

This research looks at the role of graduate placement programmes in bridging the gap between higher education and the small- and medium-sized enterprise (SME) sector. The research design and methodology used in this study was exploratory, in-depth and qualitative in nature. The research took the form of a multiple case study and focused on seven graduates with an engineering, science or technology background who have worked with SMEs. The graduates were employed by companies participating in the Fusion programme, a graduate placement and knowledge transfer programme currently running in the Republic of Ireland and Northern Ireland (the UK). The study shows that graduate placement programmes such as Fusion can help graduates in their transition to the SME workplace, but the impact can vary according to the individual placement context. Implications for policy and future research are considered.     

非认知能力在大学毕业生从学校到工作过渡中的作用及培养

人力资本理论强调教育通过传授知识技能提高劳动者的劳动生产率,影响劳动力市场的产出。近年来国际教育经济学界特别关注非认知能力对个人发展的作用及教育对于非认知能力的影响。非认知能力在教育影响劳动力市场产出这一关系中表现为:工作前毕业生评价自身就业力主要基于专业能力,工作后个性品质等非认知能力因素对于毕业生适应职场、提高就业力等发挥了更重要的作用。非认知能力因素可以通过参与社团活动、丰富校园生活、增进人际交流、建设校园精神文化等途径来培养。