ASSURING GRADUATE CAPABILITIES: A UNIVERSITY-WIDE STRATEGY TO EXPLOIT TECHNOLOGIES FOR GRADUATE EMPLOYABILITY

摘要

This paper presents a case study on the quest find new ways to assure graduate employability by using the most effective digital technologies: paradoxically, employability challenges are increasing at the same time that emerging technologies provide individuals with greater opportunity to 'be their own brand'. Deakin University, 40 years old, was founded as a distance education provider. Today, it has 50,000 enrolled students (about 80% elect to study in a traditional on campus mode - with extensive digital resources; and 20% elect to study completely online). Today's 'distance' learners may live around the comer, or in very remote Australian communities. Deakin's promise to its students is to "offer a brilliant education where students are [academically, geographically] and where they want to go [in their lives and careers]. In particular, Deakin set itself the challenge to use the technologies at the digital frontier to offer education that assures graduate employability, meaning that students and new graduates are supported and prompted to acquire "the skills, understandings and personal attributes that make [them] more likely to secure employment and be successful in their chosen occupations to the benefit of themselves, the workforce, the community and the economy" (Yorke, 2006). In brief, the task was to refresh the curriculum and the digital spaces to assure engaging learning experiences for all students, and equip them with the capabilities to find either traditional positions and create new modes of employment in a digitally enhanced world. This work has been underway since mid-2012 and centres on student achievement of the Deakin Graduate Learning Outcomes: 1 Discipline knowledge; 2 Communication; 3 Digital literacy; 4 Critical thinking; 5 Problem solving; 6 Self-management; 7 Teamwork; 8 Global citizenship. Strategies include: 1. Institution-wide curriculum framework: devising and implementing the curriculum framework and the institution's agreed 21C graduate capabilities, expressed as the Deakin Graduate Learning Outcomes; 2. Curriculum renewal: Embedding the Graduate Learning Outcomes in every degree, expressed as Course Learning Outcomes and Standards, ensuring assessment is redesigned to prompt students to create digital artefacts that evidence their achievements; 3. Reconfigure the learning management system (LMS): to meet minimum standards to enable achievement of the Graduate Learning Outcomes in every degree; 4. DeakinSync: Overlaying the LMS with an overarching digital hub that enables students to access all services as well as have direct entry to the units in the learning management system, and self-enabling tools such as portfolio and connectivity tools; 5. Me in a Minute providing all students with a free service to showcase their achievement of capabilities and make their one-minute video pitch to prospective employers, encouraging networking through Linkedln and other professional networks. Deakin Hallmarks, piloting 2015, using digital badging technologies to credential and warrant outstanding achievement of the Graduate Learning Outcomes.