Basic Skills in Higher Education: An Analysis of Attributed Importance

Abstract

Today, the skills-based approach is increasingly in demand by companies due, in large part, to the fact that it favors the management of human resources by focusing on individual capabilities; which, finally, improves the job profile of a company. As a result, choosing the right candidates has become increasingly selective. Universities, therefore, need to teach skills to improve the incorporation of graduates into the workplace making it as successful as possible. For this reason, it is of special relevance to know if college students consider that the acquisition of skills is key for their incorporation into the workplace. The main objective of this study was to analyze and compare the importance assigned to the acquisition of basic skills in the university education of 694 students studying four different bachelor degrees: pedagogy, early childhood education, primary education, and psychology. For this purpose, a Likert-type questionnaire on basic skills was distributed with four possible options and the following five dimensions that grouped basic skills: organizational and planning capacity; access to information sources; analysis and synthesis of texts, situations, and people; teamwork; and problem solving. The results show that as a whole all students across different bachelor degrees gave a high score to the acquisition of basic skills, with early childhood education students giving it greater importance compared to the students from other disciplines and, more specifically, differences were observed in some dimensions depending on the bachelor degree that they have started.

Do graduate students aim to teach broad-based “employable” skills in online courses?

“…Teaching employable skills gives students agency to pursue multiple career paths, which is of paramount importance given that most college graduates will hold a variety of jobs over their careers, including many unrelated to their undergraduate majors (American Psychological Association, 2016; Pew Research Center, 2014). Both undergraduates and alumni alike highly value broad-based skills developed in college coursework (Aranda et al, 2022; Landrum et al, 2010). Yet, despite positive views toward skill development, concerns remain that colleges are not doing enough to prepare students for the workforce (Arum & Roksa, 2011; Wilkie, 2019).…”

Enhancing Generic Skills Development in Higher Education in the Era of Large Language Model Artificial Intelligence

“…Interesting findings have emerged from individual studies, such as that female graduates have more confidence about their ability to acquire generic skills than males (Wickramasinghe & Perera, 2010); that the perceived importance of generic skills acquisition by students varies according to the subject of the degree they are studying (e.g. Aranda et al, 2022); that academics consider problem-solving most important whereas corporate human resources managers value teamwork and collaboration skills more highly (Emin Bakay, 2022); that business students tend to over-estimate their own employability skills (Jackson, 2012); and that human resources recruiters believe leadership skills generally are below the expectations of industry (e.g. Rosenberg et al, 2012).…”

Facilitating Development of Problem-Solving Skills in Veterinary Learners with Clinical Examples

“…Problem solving should encourage the use of higher-order thinking skills to effectively manage and critically determine realistic solutions to problems. It is a basic skill or tool that is needed by employees for addressing workplace demands [ 1 , 15 ]. Problem-solving requires a complex set of attitudinal, behavioral and cognitive components, often used in a multiple-step process to arrive to the solution (i.e., collection, interpretation and integration of information) [ 14 , 16 ].…”

“…One of the relatively common deficiencies in veterinary medical education is the lack of assisting of veterinary learners in the development of their clinical reasoning skills. However, if successful in the development of these skills it will make them more competitive in the employment market, an important outcome for modern education [ 1 , 2 ]. Indeed, developing clinical reasoning skills in learners is a requisite of any accreditation body for schools that are required to undergo accreditation [ 3 ].…”