FACILITATING GRADUATE STUDENTS' PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT: IMPLEMENTATION AND EVALUATION OF LEARNING ACTIVITIES

摘要

Doctoral education is criticized for its lack of preparation of doctoral students for careers outside of academia. Multiple stakeholders including researchers, educators, administrators, and industry leaders have pointed out the necessity to offer systematic training and professional development opportunities to doctoral students to prepare them for a broader range of academic as well as nonacademic career opportunities. In this context, "Preparing Future Professionals", a graduate-level course, was designed and implemented to facilitate the development of graduate students in their skills, roles, and responsibilities as global citizens and future professionals in business and corporate environment. In the process of facilitating graduate students' professional skills and attributes, the research team developed interactive learning activities that centered on the theme of helping the transition of graduate students' roles to future professionals in businesses and industry. These learning activities cover a variety of critical aspects in the transition to business and industry, such as skills and competencies, career management, organization types and cultures, roles and responsibilities, and balancing career and personal life. These interactive learning activities include, Cultivating Your Professional Identity; CARS (Context, Action, Result, Skills) Impact Statements; Creating a Networking Map; Job Description Analysis; Developing Job Search Strategies; Self-Assessment; Institutional Profile; Individual Development Plan and Career Strategic Plan. The implementation of these activities aims at addressing the different aspects of graduate students' professional development. These activities have been piloted among 34 graduate students. This paper provides an overview of the design and implementation of these learning activities and the analysis of students' deliverables in the evaluation of students' learning outcomes.