Students’ ‘approach to develop’ in holistic competency: an adaption of the 3P model

Constructive alignment between holistic competency development and assessment in Hong Kong engineering education

“…In this paper, we assume the latter to suggest that students' holistic competencies can be developed and enhanced in the university when proper support and guidance are provided. According to previous research (Chan & Luo, 2021; Chan & Yeung, 2019), hiding holistic competencies in the curriculum might leave students uncertain about the purpose and expectations for competency development, leading to a tendency for them not to take such development seriously. Therefore, we also argue that students' holistic competencies should be explicitly targeted, developed, and assessed in the engineering curriculum rather than assuming that students will acquire them as a matter of course.…”

“…This reform influenced all disciplines in local higher education and, therefore, also further motivated engineering educators to focus on teaching quality and students' holistic development. All local public universities have explicitly included competency development in their graduate attributes (e.g., The University of Hong Kong, 2019; The Hong Kong University of Science and Technology, 2019), and there is increased research documenting innovative curricular practices in local engineering education that promote students' whole‐person development (e.g., Chan & Yeung, 2019; Zou & Mickleborough, 2015). While these initiatives indicate a positive trend, they also elicit a number of further questions.…”

“…Holistic competencies need to be developed over time; in the university, their development occurs incrementally through regular practice and feedback throughout the entire curriculum (Bunney et al, 2015; Chan & Yeung, 2019). Although the effectiveness of experiential teaching activities, such as cooperative and problem‐based learning, for fostering holistic competencies has been supported by empirical research (Prince, 2004), pure lecture‐based instruction is still predominant in many engineering courses around the world (Nepal & Jenkins, 2011).…”

“…However, in exam‐oriented cultures such as Hong Kong, assessment can also result in students' loss of interest in holistic competency development entirely or for them to seek development only for the sake of good grades (Chan & Yeung, 2019). The dilemma is that without formal assessment, it is less likely that instructors and students will take holistic competency development seriously in a curriculum that already has tight time constraints and heavy workloads (Chan, Fong, et al, 2017).…”

Optimizing Placement of Field Experience Program: An Integration of MOORA and Rule-Based Decision Making

“…To date, a strong and efficient professional competency of teachers should be redefined on the development of human life and education as field competencies, pedagogical competencies, research competencies, curriculum competencies, lifelong learning competencies, social-cultural competencies, emotional competencies, communication competencies, information and communication technologies competencies and environmental competencies (Selvi, 2010). The above competencies imply developing students' competencies towards acquiring self-confidence, learning motivation, and social skills (Chan & Yeung, 2019). This issue aims to allow academics in the field to study and assess their lessons and skills critically.…”