Developing Foundational Generic Skills in First Year Business Students: Confirmations and Contradictions

2014 ◽  
Vol 20 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-17
Author(s):  
Alison Dean ◽  
Kym Cowley ◽  
Vivien McComb
Keyword(s):  
Business Students ◽  
First Year ◽  
Generic Skills

Reweaving the rainbow: qualitative color in business education

2018 ◽  
Vol 26 (3) ◽  
pp. 238-246 ◽  
Author(s):  
David Starr-Glass
Keyword(s):  
Business Education ◽  
Business School ◽  
Business Schools ◽  
Business Students ◽  
First Year ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Central Direction ◽  
Undergraduate Economics ◽  
Personal Insight ◽  
Limited Generalizability

Purpose This study aims to reflect on the dominance of a narrowly focused analytical approach within business schools, which provides an artificially fractured and disjointed understanding of the contextual complexities and interconnectedness that students will encounter in the future. This approach unnecessarily constrains sensemaking and inhibits creative response to future social and organizational complexity. As business schools and their graduates come under sustained scrutiny and criticism, it perhaps appropriate to reexamine and reframe their analytical bias. Design/methodology/approach The central direction taken in this study is that of critical reflection on the present author’s practice and experience in teaching undergraduate economics and accounting. Although the analysis may have limited generalizability, it is hoped that it may prove of interest and value to business school educators. Findings The preferential business school reliance on analytical perspectives suggest that they fail to appreciate the nature of business, its embeddedness in broader society and the competencies required by undergraduates and graduates. This study argues that an emphasis on holistic systems, synthetic fusion and an appreciation of complexity – rather than a reductive analytical agenda – might benefit business schools, their graduates and society at large. Originality/value This study provides an original, albeit personal, insight into a significant problem in business education. It offers original perspectives on the problem and presents faculty-centered suggestions on how business students might be encouraged and empowered to see quality as well as quantitative perspectives in their first-year courses.

Convergence at What Cost?

2016 ◽  
pp. 1328-1346
Author(s):  
Daniel A. Glaser-Segura ◽  
Suzanne D. Mudge ◽  
Constantin Bratianu ◽  
Ivona Orzea
Keyword(s):  
Identity Development ◽  
Professional Identity ◽  
Business Students ◽  
Bologna Process ◽  
First Year ◽  
Professional Identity Development ◽  
Self In Relation ◽  
Quasi Experimental ◽  
Academic Credits ◽  
The Bologna Process

The Bologna Process instituted measures promoting common curriculum throughout Europe with three-year standards established for Bachelor programs in economics, humanistic and positive sciences, and four-year standards for engineering sciences. Dramatic reductions were made to programs resulting in students moving into the workforce at a faster pace and with fewer academic credits. Questions existed as to whether three-year programs were sufficient for professional identity development. Professional identity, a system of attributes and values one has about self in relation to professional role, is essential for professional culture integration. This chapter employs a quasi-experimental design to compare professional identity development of Romanian business students ranging from first- through third-year using 2012 data and fourth-year students using 2007 data. Findings reveal professional identity within post-Bologna Process programs rose from first year to second but fell in the end-of-program third year. Data from pre-Bologna Process programs show higher measures of professional identity for end-of-program fourth-year students. Interpretations are provided and student workforce readiness discussed.

Information Literacy Education for First-Year Composition Students

2018 ◽  
pp. 85-121 ◽  
Author(s):  
Monica D. T. Rysavy ◽  
Russell Michalak ◽  
Kevin Hunt
Keyword(s):  
Information Literacy ◽  
Business Students ◽  
Literacy Skills ◽  
First Year ◽  
Literacy Assessment ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Composition Students ◽  
First Year Composition ◽  
Composition Course ◽  
International Graduate

This chapter describes how the researchers at a small private Master's level college examined how different delivery modes—face-to-face (F2F), hybrid, and online instruction—may impact first-year students' perceptions of their information literacy (IL) skills compared to their test-assessed information literacy skills using the students perception of information literacy-questionnaire (SPIL-Q) and information literacy assessment (ILA) instruments. These instruments were developed and deployed to international graduate business students in two previous studies: Michalak and Rysavy and Michalak, Rysavy, and Wessel. The students (n=161) in this study were enrolled in a first-year English composition course in the Spring 2017 semester. This iteration achieved an overall response rate of 87.04% (n=141). Overall, results demonstrated the greatest achievement were demonstrated by students in hybrid course sections.

scholarly journals First-year undergraduate business students’ choice of different sources of learning support for assumed math skills

2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 1616654
Author(s):  
Anne Gleeson ◽  
Greg Fisher ◽  
Saib Dianati ◽  
Nicholas Smale ◽  
Luís Tinoca
Keyword(s):  
Business Students ◽  
First Year ◽  
Learning Support ◽  
Math Skills ◽  
Different Sources ◽  
Undergraduate Business Students

Identifying New Virtual Competencies for the Digital Age

2011 ◽  
pp. 174-192
Author(s):  
Kathryn Gow
Keyword(s):  
Digital Age ◽  
Social Software ◽  
First Year ◽  
Generic Skills ◽  
Ict Skills ◽  
Entry Level ◽  
The World ◽  
Basic Competencies ◽  
Graduating Students ◽  
The Web

This chapter focuses on the identification of a range of competencies that entry level workers, and thus graduating students, will need to acquire to be successful in the 21st Century of work. While core or basic competencies will still form the prerequisite generic skills that all entry level workers must demonstrate, as the first year progresses, depending on the field in which they are employed, they will be asked to utilise self management, entrepreneurial, and virtual competencies in order to maintain their employment status. Even if they have ICT skills, they will need to have the knowledge and ability in social software, as well as the ability to communicate across the Web, in order to succeed in the digital age. Other attributes, such as cross cultural and professional skills, along with an appreciation of Web ontologies will facilitate entry-level workers as they move into the world of international liaisons.

Impact of cooperative learning on teamwork competence

2019 ◽  
Vol 32 (1) ◽  
pp. 93-106 ◽  
Author(s):  
Melany Hebles ◽  
Concepción Yaniz-Álvarez-de-Eulate ◽  
Mauricio Jara
Keyword(s):  
Cooperative Learning ◽  
Collective Efficacy ◽  
Business Students ◽  
Control Group ◽  
First Year ◽  
First Year Students ◽  
Content Type ◽  
Five Dimensions ◽  
Complex Dimensions ◽  
The Impact

PurposeThe purpose of this paper is to analyze the impact of a classroom application of the cooperative learning (CL) methodology on nine dimensions of business students’ teamwork competence (TC).Design/methodology/approachThe authors used a quasi-experimental pre-post design with a previous cohort as control group (first-year students from the year prior to treatment application), applying treatment to a sample of 228 first-year students in a School of Economics and Business at a Chilean University (114 as treatment and 114 as control).FindingsThe authors’ results show that CL had a positive, significant influence on five dimensions of TC: collective efficacy, planning, goal setting, problem solving and conflict management.Research limitations/implicationsThis paper upholds the importance and effectiveness of CL in developing TC. However, the evidence suggests that the effectiveness of the CL methodology was limited to development and improvement of less complex dimensions of TC. More complex dimensions require a longer period of time to be developed.Practical implicationsThis research is an important contribution to the design and implementation of appropriate methodologies for developing a widely needed area of competence in the workplace, considering its multidimensional nature, whether in academia or business.Originality/valueThis is the first study to seek empirical evidence that would link the CL methodology with TC. In addition, it fills a gap in the literature on the development of TC in its multiple dimensions. It particularly addresses the training of business professionals.

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