scholarly journals Balancing skills in the digital transformation era: The future of jobs and the role of higher education

2021 ◽  
pp. 095042222110297
Author(s):  
Vera G. Goulart ◽  
Lara Bartocci Liboni ◽  
Luciana Oranges Cezarino
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Personal Development ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Transfer Of Knowledge ◽  
Human Resource Managers ◽  
Financial Loss ◽  
Job Market ◽  
Qualitative Approaches ◽  
Technological Advances

Developing human resources and matching job profiles are essential tasks to promote economic and social growth. The technology-related job market has undergone significant changes over recent years, mainly due to technological advances that have pushed industry toward new demands for skilled professionals. This change in required skills and competencies has led to a gap between what companies need and the professional profiles that are available in the job market. Technology companies are often unable to find an employee who meets the required profile, resulting in financial loss and extra training expenses. It is therefore essential that higher education in technology is reconsidered to address job market demands. Thus the goal of this work is to evaluate the relationship between the professional profile required by information technology (IT) companies and what students are taught on IT-related programs in higher education institutions (HEIs). The authors adopt a systemic perspective in three different qualitative approaches. They cross-check and link data on educational curricula acquired from interviews with IT human resource managers (HRMs) and student focus groups. The analysis reveals that HEIs must go beyond the transfer of knowledge and technical qualification in IT, promoting a comprehensive education that incorporates personal development goals, with a focus on developing social and emotional skills. The study focuses on the emerging economy of Brazil and presents findings from which other developing countries can learn. The results reveal the critical role of soft skills in the professional development and employability of students and the associated challenge for technical education. In conclusion, the authors also highlight the importance of partnerships between HEIs and HRMs as a fundamental strategy to fulfill the current skills gap.

Critical Role of Global and Culturally Responsive Leadership for Higher Education in the 21st-Century

2020 ◽  
Vol 10 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Eric Archer ◽  
Yuqian Zhang
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Culturally Responsive ◽  
Higher Education Institutions ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Global Leadership ◽  
Technological Revolution ◽  
Culturally Responsive Leadership ◽  
Leadership Curriculum

“We are on the precipice of an epoch,” in which 21st century organizations are facing a complex, competitive landscape driven largely by globalization and the technological revolution (Hitt, 1998, p. 218). As such, Bikson, Treverton, Moini and Lindstrom (2003) have urged universities to develop a global leadership curriculum, based on their prediction of a future shortage of global leaders in all sectors. This essay examines the critical role of global and culturally responsive leadership for graduates of higher education institutions.

Overcoming Complacency Through Quality Intelligence in Greek Higher Education

2020 ◽  
pp. 121-140
Author(s):  
Loukas Anninos
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Performance Evaluation ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
The State ◽  
Academic Leadership ◽  
Evolutionary Perspective ◽  
Institutional Improvement ◽  
University Performance ◽  
Institutional Initiatives

During the last decade, an intensification of evaluation at the Greek universities has been noted, encouraged by the state and institutional initiatives aiming to reform, modernize, and cultivate a culture of excellence. The progress that has been reported was facilitated by global developments that gradually strengthened the cultural and scientific foundations of university performance evaluation and set the foundations for continuous institutional improvement and transformation. However, the role of academic leadership is crucial if universities wish to fully embrace the concept of excellence in their operations and services not from an obligatory, but from an evolutionary perspective that would allow them to learn and improve. As Greek universities are currently in the process of quality accreditation, the chapter briefly presents the framework for quality accreditation in Greek universities and underlines the critical role of academic leadership for achieving accreditation and establishing a culture for sustainable excellence.

Implementing the Team Approach in Higher Education

2008 ◽  
Vol 22 (4) ◽  
pp. 245-251 ◽  
Author(s):  
Tracy M. Lara ◽  
Aaron W. Hughey
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Needs Assessment ◽  
Higher Education Administration ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Education Administration ◽  
Team Approach ◽  
Academic Environment ◽  
Team Efficacy ◽  
The Difference

Many companies have implemented the team approach as a way to empower their employees in an effort to enhance productivity, quality and overall profitability. While application of the concept to higher education administration has been limited, colleges and universities could benefit from the team approach if implemented appropriately and conscientiously. The authors discuss some of the issues and concerns that are relevant to implementing the team approach in an academic environment. Suggestions for implementing teams in higher education are provided, including the difference between the team approach and traditional administration, the importance of a preliminary needs assessment, the development of an implementation plan, the critical role of leadership, dealing with issues of assessment and accountability, and the concept of team efficacy.

scholarly journals Preface: Science, disarmament and diplomacy in chemical education: the example of the organisation for the prohibition of chemical weapons – The Spring 2016 Confchem

2017 ◽  
Vol 89 (2) ◽  
pp. 183-188
Author(s):  
Robert E. Belford ◽  
Jonathan E. Forman
Keyword(s):  
Critical Role ◽  
Chemical Education ◽  
Chemical Weapons ◽  
Nobel Peace Prize ◽  
Scientific Communities ◽  
Technological Advances ◽  
Chemical Weapons Convention ◽  
The Future ◽  
Multilateral Diplomacy

AbstractIn May and June of 2016 the Organisation for the Prohibition of Chemical Weapons (OPCW), IUPAC and the ACS CHED Committee on Computers in Chemical Education (CCCE) collaboratively ran an online conference hosted with the online ConfChem conference system on “Science, Disarmament and Diplomacy in Chemical Education.”This ConfChem Online Conference was designed to highlight the work of the OPCW and the important contribution of scientists and educators to achieving its goals, the science that underpins the Chemical Weapons Convention, and how scientific and technological advances will help to better implement the Convention in the future.The OPCW is the implementing body for Chemical Weapons Convention, an international disarmament treaty banning chemical weapons. The organisation is now approaching the 20th anniversary of the entry into force of the Chemical Weapons Convention in 1997. Twenty years that have seen the destruction of more than 67 000 metric ton of the world’s declared military stockpiles of chemical weapons and a Nobel Peace Prize in 2013. With 192 States Parties (the governments that have agreed to uphold the norms and obligations required by the treaty), the Chemical Weapons Convention is the most widely subscribed disarmament treaty in history.Despite the aforementioned successes, the OPCW is not widely recognized outside disarmament-focused diplomatic circles. This is in spite of the fact that the science of chemistry played a critical role in informing the negotiations that lead to the signing of the Chemical Weapons Convention, and underpinning the articles of implementation. Science represents an important dimension in international disarmament policy and diplomacy, requiring that organizations like the OPCW interact with the scientific communities – especially in the field of chemistry. In order to achieve its goals in the future, the OPCW will need to reach out to new stakeholders and strengthen its ties with its existing partners. To this end, the OPCW has been placing increasing priority on education and engagement to raise awareness of its work and the contributions both from and to science in chemical disarmament.The objective of this internationally open access ConfChem online conference was to bring forth educational material that could usefully introduce chemistry educators and students to the nexus of science and multilateral diplomacy in chemical disarmament. To this end, we introduce the seven papers of the ConfChem and their authors. We hope you enjoy this collection of papers at the intersection of science and international disarmament policy. A collection that looks to stimulate interest in the role of scientists and educators, especially chemists in making the world a safer place.

scholarly journals Competences and learning outcomes: a panacea for understanding the (new) role of Higher Education?

2014 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 279 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Wagenaar
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Learning Outcomes ◽  
Personal Development ◽  
Academic Staff ◽  
Unique Contribution ◽  
Learning And Teaching ◽  
Educational Programmes ◽  
Effective Performance ◽  
The One

The competence and learning outcomes approach, which intends to improve effective performance of academic staff and students, is becoming dominant in today’s higher education. This was quite different 15 years ago. This contribution aims to offer insight in the reforms initiated and implemented, by posing and answering the questions why the time was appropriate — by identifying and analysing the underlying conditions — and in what way the change was shaped — by focusing on terminology required and approaches developed. Central here is the role the Tuning project — launched in 2000-2001 — played in this respect. The contribution starts with contextualising the situation in the 1990s: the recession and growing unemployment in many European countries on the one hand and the development of a global society and the challenges the higher educational sector faced at the other. It offers the background for initiating the Tuning project, and the discourse on which its approach is based. In particular, attention is given to choosing the concept of competences, distinguishing subject specific and general/generic ones, as an integrating approach of knowledge, understanding, skills, abilities and attitudes. The approach should serve as a means of integrating a number of main goals as part of the learning and teaching process: strengthening employability and preparing for citizenship besides personal development of the student as a basis for the required educational reform. Tuning’s unique contribution is the alignment of this concept to learning outcomes statements as indicators of competence development and achievement and by relating both concepts to profiling of educational programmes.

From Crisis to Vision

2022 ◽  
pp. 29-44
Author(s):  
Alan Bruce
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Social Justice ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
External Environment ◽  
Global Learning ◽  
Learning Models ◽  
Human Needs ◽  
International Perspectives ◽  
Justice Model

Higher education now faces the critical role of partnerships, linkage, and strategic joint ventures to achieve shared goals in a transformed external environment. This environment is itself shaped not only by the pressures of neo-liberal competition, but by a set of crises emerging from the contradictions that is producing greater levels of inequity and social division. It is in this context that the chapter evaluates the importance of global learning as a critical tool to understand, engage with, and potentially transform a globalized socio-economic environment and engage proactively with existing multiple crises. Academics and educators are now intimately connected to the need to articulate and demonstrate globalized learning models and reflective practice founded on explicitly international perspectives. Given the urgency, internationalization alone is insufficient to achieve transformation. A re-appropriation of purpose and values is also required within an emancipatory and social justice model that asserts human needs, not corporate efficiency.

The skill of discipline – measuring F.I.R.S.T discipline principles in higher education

2020 ◽  
Vol ahead-of-print (ahead-of-print) ◽  
Author(s):  
Hana Krskova ◽  
Chris Baumann ◽  
Yvonne Breyer ◽  
Leigh Norma Wood
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Cognitive Skills ◽  
Personal Development ◽  
Online Survey ◽  
Critical Role ◽  
Self Regulation ◽  
Principal Component ◽  
The United States ◽  
Student Discipline ◽  
Content Type

PurposeHuman capital theory suggests that any increase in skills translates into greater productivity of the workforce. Non-cognitive skills, in particular, play a critical role in many domains in life. The aim of this study is to gain a greater understanding of one such skill, discipline. Viewing discipline as a tool for enhancing learning, personal development and increasing overall achievement, this study offers an alternative way to measure discipline in higher education.Design/methodology/approachThis paper presents the results of an online survey of 537 current students and recent graduates from the United States, South Korea and China. Principal component analysis was used to test the overarching assumption that student discipline is composed of five dimensions. Multiple analysis of variance (ANOVA) with post hoc analyses and t-tests were applied to test for country and gender-related differences between the three country groups. Cluster analysis was used to profile the respondent groups based on similarities across the samples.FindingsThe results confirm that student discipline is a construct comprising five discipline dimensions – focus, intention, responsibility, structure and time (F.I.R.S.T). In addition, the identification of low, medium and high discipline levels among the respondents provides support for the recently introduced concept of a layered “threshold of Discipline”.Originality/valueA F.I.R.S.T. discipline measurement questionnaire for capturing student discipline – underpinned by a conceptual model encompassing self-determination, goal setting, self-efficacy, self-regulation and time management principles – was developed and tested. Suggestions for enhancing graduate work readiness through increasing levels of the skill of discipline are outlined.

scholarly journals Student achievement emotions: Examining the role of frequent online assessment

2021 ◽  
pp. 75-87
Author(s):  
Kaitlin Riegel ◽  
Tanya Evans
Keyword(s):  
Higher Education ◽  
Positive Emotions ◽  
Negative Emotions ◽  
Value Theory ◽  
Online Assessment ◽  
Achievement Emotions ◽  
Control Value ◽  
Qualitative Approaches ◽  
Positive Assessment

The rapid inclusion of online assessment in higher education has left a void in investigating the relationship this form of assessment has with student emotions. This study examines the influence of frequent online assessment on student emotions in a university setting using a mixed-methods approach. Students' emotions in an online quiz and a traditional classroom test in a second-year mathematics course (n = 91) were analysed using both quantitative and qualitative approaches, through the lens of the control-value theory. The study used an adaptation of the Achievement Emotions Questionnaire (AEQ) to collect data on reported student emotions in both assessments, as well as qualitative data on student’s views of the frequent online assessment. Students reported higher levels of positive emotions and lower levels of negative emotions in an online quiz compared to the test, and we attempted to identify sources of these differences. The findings are discussed together with implications for habitualisation of assessment emotions. Practically grounded generalisations are outlined as opportunities for disrupting negative emotions and reaffirming positive emotions, which are suitable for implementation in higher education on a broad scale. Implications for practice or policy: For educators designing tertiary assessment aimed at promoting positive and reducing negative emotions, we advise incorporating features that students perceive as allowing them greater control over obtaining success. Specifically, we advise incorporating frequent low stakes online quizzes into tertiary courses. These present opportunities for students to habitualise positive assessment-related emotions, which correlate with performance and constructs such as self-efficacy. The Achievement Emotions Questionnaires (AEQ) can be adapted to investigate achievement emotions in different forms of assessment.

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