Recent criticism of higher education accreditation has prompted calls for reform and sparked interest in piloting alternative quality assurance methods that better address student learning and employment outcomes. Although this debate has brought much needed attention to improving the outcomes of graduates and safeguarding federal investment in…

This publication presents information on employers' use and views of the vocational education and training (VET) system. The findings relate to the various ways in which Australian employers use the VET system and unaccredited training to meet their skill needs, and their satisfaction with these methods of training. Australian employers can engage…

Education and training systems need the right tools and processes to plan and develop their digital capacity. SELFIE for work-based learning (SELFIE WBL) provides one such tool. SELFIE stands for self-reflection on effective learning by fostering the use of innovative educational technologies. SELFIE WBL is a self-reflection tool for vocational…

The Learning Outcomes in Communication (LOC) grant project isolated and refined what communication majors should "know" and be able to "do." The LOC project was an opportunity to begin a conversation in the discipline about the breadth of personal and professional competencies taught in programs. The resulting LOCs are…

The Australian economy is in transition. Its future prosperity will depend on greater economic diversification and on innovation and entrepreneurship, hallmarks of Industry 4.0. This has implications for skills development for future workers and for those needing to move into new jobs or roles. It also has a direct impact on apprenticeships--an…

Drawing on the research done for the British Academy's Born Global project, this chapter explores employer demand for the skills graduates in and with languages can develop. The research outcomes raise challenges for Higher Education (HE) professionals to articulate more clearly the nature of language degrees and the transnational profile of their…

Excitement is growing about the potential for competency-based education (CBE) to become a transformative force in higher education. Yet while much of the attention paid to ever-expanding CBE efforts focuses on student and institutional priorities, little effort has been made to understand the perspectives and needs of the employers who must hire…

VET (vocational education and training) is a fascinating sector. Aligned closely with the labour market and sandwiched between two major sectors, it is continually buffeted by political winds, susceptible to the ideologies of different governments. Often labelled the "poor cousin", debates continue to rage about its quality. This paper…

This article considers questions of "employability," a notion foregrounded in the Green and White Papers on the Teaching Excellence Framework (TEF). The paper first questions government imperatives concerning employability and suggests a series of mismatches that are evident in the rhetorics in this area. This summary opens up elements…

This paper explores ways to enhance overseas Chinese graduate employability by taking Finnish-educated Chinese students/graduates as an example. In so doing, it understands that graduate employability development is a joint effort of multiple stakeholders including students, graduates, academics, program coordinators, employers, and policymakers.…

This article presents the research context for a 2013 investigation of how discipline of study at undergraduate level contributes to the development of generic problem solving skills. Inspired by a number of recent higher education policy developments in Ireland, it takes a different approach to the utility debate that seems to plague discussions…

The paper considers whether bilingualism has an economic value in Slovenia's two ethnically mixed regions, or whether its value is more related to identity, and restricted primarily to the personal, educational and cultural spheres. Specifically, it asks whether bilingualism is rewarded on the labour market and what local people think about this…

Because of the surging demand for undergraduate business degrees and the increasing availability of effective online educational content, many traditional regional universities have added, or are now considering adding, online undergraduate business degree programs to their classroom programs. Through a review of the literature bearing on that…

In this article, Jose Antonio Bowen, president of Goucher College, writes that a new technological society inclusive of all students and graduates, a new model of education geared toward the learning economy, where more--maybe even most--content learning takes place after graduation may be required. Bowen believes that in order to prepare students…

Distance education institutions, students and staff have often had to overcome negative perceptions about the overall quality of their programmes and qualifications. In this paper, we identify four of the major challenges cited as undermining the credibility and effectiveness of open, distance and e-learning (ODeL): the quality of teaching,…