Undergraduate internships have gained popularity among students, universities, governments and firms since the creation of the European Higher Education Area. However, empirical research on the relationship between internships and labour market performance of graduates is still scarce, particularly in Spain. This paper examines whether internships…

Purpose: This paper aims to present key characteristics of educational design briefs for the circular economy (CE) through the analysis of 11 design briefs focussing on real-life challenges related to sustainability and the CE, developed with collaborating industry partners for four consecutive circular design internships conducted in Ireland,…

This paper aims to examine the role of management programmes in students' development of management competences. Data were drawn from supervisors' assessments of the actual achievement of these competences among students on the IQS Undergraduate Programme in Tourism and Hospitality Management. The results over a sample of 121 students show that…

Globalisation, technological changes and the industry-to-service economy transition has produced dramatic changes in the labour market, thus affecting higher education. It is no longer sufficient to provide students with disciplinary knowledge. Graduates are also expected to be adaptive, innovative and flexible. As these competencies are better…

This study investigates the factors that influence how long it takes for master's-level graduate students to find employment. The original contribution stems from questioning whether the structure and content of university programmes play a role in graduates' ability to secure jobs. To this end, we focus on three dimensions at three points in time…

Contribution: Internships designed to provide training and an initial period of contact with industry, prior to a computer science engineering capstone project, have a very positive impact on both industry and academic capstone projects. Background: Internships and capstone projects are widely used to integrate work-related learning in computer…

The assessment process in higher education considers four aspects: assessment agents, procedure, content, and scoring. In this study, we delve into the who. We analyze the role of transversal competence assessment agents in the framework of professional internships in university master's degree programs, comparing the suitability of their…

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to examine the level of correspondence between the academic training received by students and the demands of the job market. This was achieved by analysing the competences that are developed in internships to provide useful information for universities, students and tourism companies.…

This article explores which measures are perceived by European key stakeholders (students, employers and academics) as crucial for the development of curricula that provide graduates with working-life competences and key skills that may increase their employability. It also seeks to identify measures that may strengthen cooperation between…

This article presents an empirical study on the perceptions of university students toward the development of the teaching practicum, using the CourseSites platform as a communication and support tool for their training. The opinions of the students were collected through a questionnaire. The sample consisted of 1500 students who were registered in…

This article explores how three different learning spaces could be appropriate for developing a sense of global citizenship among university students. We draw on an interview study conducted at the Universitat Politècnica of Valencia (UPV) between 2010 and 2012. The spaces analyzed were two electives devoted to international cooperation, a…

In the past decades, the importance of developing and validating informal and nonformal learning processes has been launched by several international organizations including UNESCO and the OECD, originally mostly focusing on adult learning experiences. Meanwhile, in recent years an increased focus has been evidenced on introducing informal and…

Background: The literature has shown that the way active labour market policies (ALMP) aimed at youth are designed and implemented can influence the labour and educational prospects of youngsters. The evaluation of the Catalan PQPIs (initial vocational qualification programmes) presented here seeks to provide new evidence on the effectiveness of…

The dynamics of the world today demands a change in traditional education paradigms to enable the creation of more efficient learning environments, where students will learn more effectively and will play a more active role in their education. They should interact with the knowledge at anytime-anywhere. In order to tackle this problem we should…

Building relationships between universities and industry bodies is of prime importance for creating value for universities' stakeholders. This paper focuses on relationships in relation to undergraduate internship programmes in the Social Sciences. Using the relationship marketing approach, we analyze this type of collaboration of firms with a…