Lessons Learned from Online Teaching and Their Implications for Students’ Future Careers: Combined PLS-SEM and IPA Approach

Abstract

As far as students are concerned, there is a well-founded relationship between academic performance and career management from which a special professional path can result, based on the multitude of knowledge, skills, and experiences acquired during the years of study. To this end, the presence and help of teachers participating in the learning process, the teaching activities they are involved in, and their own participation are determinant factors. This research aims to highlight the impact that the above factors have on the professional future of students. For this purpose, 395 respondents, including students in the bachelor’s and master’s cycles, were involved in the research process, to whom a questionnaire was given in electronic format during two stages: one where the didactic activity was carried out in online format and the other carried out face-to-face. Hypotheses testing was performed using partial least squares structural equation modeling. The present study focuses on two main directions regarding the results obtained. Thus, with respect to the acquisition of knowledge and the development of student skills, it emerged that the effect of the content in the didactic activities on student skills and the development of competencies is strengthened by the skills and degree of involvement of the teaching staff from the university environment. Related to the management of students’ careers, the analysis showed that the effect of the content in didactic activities is complemented by the accumulation of knowledge and the formation of student skills. The rigorous economic training resulting from didactic activities constitutes a main pillar in the students’ future, even more so depending on how much they perceive that the topics covered in the university courses are of interest to them. The results of this study can serve as theoretical support for future research that addresses the topic of student career management and the implications of university activities on knowledge and skills. In addition, the results can support decisions for the management of higher education institutions regarding the development and implementation of university programs and educational strategies with the aim of increasing the involvement of teachers and students in the teaching–learning process.

Behavioral Intentions to Use Energy Efficiency Smart Solutions under the Impact of Social Influence: An Extended TAM Approach

“…Furthermore, the average variance extracted (AVE) values (Table 3) for all reflective constructs were greater than 0.5, supporting the convergent validity of the PLS-SEM measurement model [55]. In terms of discriminant validity [54][55][56], all the indicator cross loading, constructs, and heterotrait-monotrait criterion (HTMT) [57] were considered. None of the indicators had any loading higher on the other constructs than on its own, and all HTMT values were lower than 0.9 threshold and (with one exception) lower than 0.85 (Table 4), thus supporting the discriminant validity of the constructs.…”

“…Following the appropriate steps [54][55][56], the reliability and validity of the measurement model were fully evaluated. First, the outer loadings (see Table 3) were above the recommended value of 0.708 [55].…”

“…None of the indicators had any loading higher on the other constructs than on its own, and all HTMT values were lower than 0.9 threshold and (with one exception) lower than 0.85 (Table 4), thus supporting the discriminant validity of the constructs. Once there was enough evidence for the reliability and validity of the outer model, the inner model was evaluated for predictive and explanatory power [54][55][56]. The first step in this process was to assess the multicollinearity between explanatory constructs based on the variance inflation factor (VIF).…”

Evaluation of the Quality of Higher Education Services by Revised IPA in the Perspective of Digitization

“…Importance-performance analysis (IPA) is a method for evaluating the perception of service quality, proposed by Martilla and James in 1977 [37]. IPA is applied in many service sectors, including higher education services [21,25,[38][39][40][41]. Later, many revised variants appeared, which is why the IPA proposed by Martilla and James [37] is often called original, classic, or standard IPA (Figure 1).…”

Understanding consumers’ intentions to purchase smart clothing using PLS-SEM and fsQCA

“…Fifth, VB-SEM easily handles reflective, formative measurement models, and more complex models [ 71 ]. Finally, over the past decade, VB-SEM has been commonly applied in consumer behavior research, such as research on supply chain management [ 72 ], environment management [ 73 ], education management [ 74 ], hotel management [ 75 ], and marketing management [ 76 ]. Therefore, this study applied VB-SEM to perform data analysis.…”