Academic Skills at Work - The Diigo Meta page

• 22 Sep 08
  

  gordon heidel

  Academic Skills at Work PAA

  • workplace competencies, such as interpersonal skills, familiarity with technology, or ability to manage resources; and foundation skills, including the basic skills of reading, writing, arithmetic, and mathematics.
  • Educators and school reformers are updating curriculum or redesigning school programs as a way to ensure that young people have opportunities to learn work-related competencies in addition to academics. Despite the interest in supporting students' development of work-related skills and attitudes, the traditional academic curriculum remains the mainstay of high school education, and many school reforms emphasize improvement in academic subjects.
  • The base premise of our approach is that skills are most appropriately viewed as multivariate. In the popular literature, a multivariate view of skills is perhaps best encapsulated in Howard Gardner's (1993) writing about multiple intelligences
  • Overall, our review of the literature reveals much tension and underlying controversy that shapes the debate about skills, and several important themes and issues.
  • The positivist perspective conceives of skills as unitary, measurable traits of individuals and holds strong assumptions about a person's ability to transfer skills from one context to another.
  • Educators grapple with changing skill needs in various ways. The literature indicates that curriculum in academic disciplines is becoming more interdisciplinary and is placing more emphasis on the application of academic knowledge to solve real problems.

  •  In general, employers seem less concerned about academic skills. They want employees who are literate and numerate, of course, but in making hiring decisions they tend to value more highly an applicant's work-related attitudes, communication skills, and previous work experience over school-related factors (e.g., grades, degree, or certification).  
  • The second strand of the study examines academic skills in the context of seven, sub-baccalaureate technical jobs in four industries
  • 1. Technical work incorporates a wide variety of mathematics skill levels, ranging from basic mathematics (pre-algebra) to complex trigonometry. 
    2. Mathematics, science, and disciplinary knowledge varies with work context. In some cases, work is dominated by a few disciplines or subject areas, while other work may require broad disciplinary knowledge. 
    3. Technical workers may not discuss academics in the terms typically used in school, but in relation to a particular work process or technology application. 
    4. In some communities of practice, it can be important to establish the precise meaning of terms related to math or science applications because individuals within a community can define important concepts in different ways. 
    5. Technology-in-use may define work practice and academic skill requirements. 
    6. Managers' and supervisors' understanding of academic skill requirements appear consistent with frontline workers' own estimation. This finding departs from our previous study of generic skills, where employers and workers often disagreed about capabilities related to problem solving, communication, and other soft skills.
      
  • The third strand of the study explored relationships between academic skills, non-academic skills, and labor market performance from the positivist perspective.
  • The analysis revealed a negative association between hours of part-time work in high school and academics, and, to a lesser extent, between hours of part-time work and extracurricular activities.

  • Previous work experience, however, is important: Students who worked more during high school earn marginally more once they enter the labor market after high school. If this preliminary work holds up, it suggests that work-based learning experiences may be especially important for students not immediately bound for college.  
  • Technology education should make explicit connections to academic skills and, above all, promote an understanding of why a particular technology application works

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