Perceptions of a university subject on leadership and intrapersonal development: reflections of the scholarship recipients

Abstract

Under the new 4-year undergraduate curriculum, students admitted to The Hong Kong Polytechnic University have to take a course on "Leadership and Intra-personal Development". A subject entitled "Tomorrow's Leaders" was developed to help students satisfy this requirement. In the second piloting exercise, five outstanding students taking this subject were invited to write reflective journals. Several common themes from these reflections are highlighted from the analyses. First, students believed there was a need for this subject. Second, the students liked the course, and they identified many positive attributes in the subject and its implementation. Third, the instructors were appreciated by the students. Fourth, the subject was seen by the students to be beneficial to their development. Finally, some suggestions for improvement were noted. When the present findings are integrated with other evaluation findings, it can be concluded that the subject is able to promote psychosocial competencies in university students taking this subject.