Naureen Durrani and Vicki N. Tariq
The purpose of this article is to explore the role and importance of numeracy skills in graduate recruitment within a diversity of employment sectors.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this article is to explore the role and importance of numeracy skills in graduate recruitment within a diversity of employment sectors.
Design/methodology/approach
The results of a mixed‐methods study, involving three online surveys (including an employer survey), student focus group sessions and interviews with tutors, are presented.
Findings
The results reveal the importance that employers attach to graduates’ numeracy skills and the extent to which employers use numeracy tests in graduate recruitment. They thus highlight the potential for poor numeracy skills to limit any graduate's acquisition of employment, irrespective of their degree subject; especially since numeracy tests are used predominantly in recruitment to the types of jobs commensurate with graduates’ career aspirations and within sectors that attract graduates from across the diversity of academic disciplines, including the arts and humanities.
Research limitations/implications
Since participants were self‐selecting any conclusions and inferences relate to the samples and may or may not be generalisable to wider target populations.
Practical implications
The paper highlights what actions are necessary to enhance undergraduates’ numeracy skills in the context of graduate employability.
Social implications
The vulnerability of particular groups of students (e.g. females, those not provided with any opportunities to practise or further develop their numeracy skills whilst in higher education, those with no (or low) pre‐university mathematics qualifications, and mature students) is highlighted.
Originality/value
The article is timely in view of national policy to extend the graduate employability performance indicators within quality assurance measures for UK higher education.
Details
Keywords
Vicki N. Tariq, Eileen M. Scott, A. Clive Cochrane, Maria Lee and Linda Ryles
Universities are encouraged to embed key skills in their undergraduate curricula, yet there is often little support on how to identify skills development and progression. This…
Abstract
Universities are encouraged to embed key skills in their undergraduate curricula, yet there is often little support on how to identify skills development and progression. This paper describes a tool that facilitates colleagues in auditing key skills and career/employability skills within individual modules and mapping these skills across degree pathways. The instrument presented supports a systematic approach to collect information on skills development. It enables tutors to highlight those skills students have the opportunity to develop or practise within a module, and to record for each skill whether explicit learner support is provided, whether the skill is assessed, and the desired standard of proficiency. The latter is identified from descriptors defined for three standards. Data collected for all modules within a degree pathway may subsequently be summarised (mapped). The tool provides valuable summary data for institutional quality assurance purposes and facilitates reflection on how to enhance students' learning experiences.
Details
Keywords
The purpose of this paper is to present an educational approach to elevating problem-solving and numeracy competencies of business undergraduates to meet workplace demand. The…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to present an educational approach to elevating problem-solving and numeracy competencies of business undergraduates to meet workplace demand. The approach is grounded in the theory of constraints following the Decoding the Discipline model. The authors investigated a cognitive bottleneck involving problem modeling and an affective bottleneck concerning low self-efficacy of numeracy and designed specific interventions to address both bottlenecks simultaneously. The authors implemented the proposed approach in an introductory level analytics course in business operations.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors use an empirical study to evaluate the effectiveness of the proposed approach in addressing deficiency in numeracy and problem-solving skills. Cognitive and affective learning interventions were introduced in an undergraduate core course in analytics. The perceived effectiveness of the interventions was evaluated with the use of a survey at the end of the course. To further investigate the effectiveness of the proposed interventions beyond self-reporting, the impact of the interventions on actual learning was evaluated by comparing the exam scores between classes with and without the interventions.
Findings
Students who underwent the interventions successfully overcame both learning bottlenecks and indicated a positive change in attitude toward the analytics discipline as well as achieved higher exam scores in the analytics course.
Research limitations/implications
This study succeeds in strengthening the body of research in teaching and learning. The authors also offer a holistic treatment of cognitive and affective learning bottlenecks, and provide empirical evidence to support the effectiveness of the proposed approach in elevating numeracy and problem-solving competencies of business undergraduates.
Practical implications
The proposed approach is useful for business educators to improve business students’ quantitative modeling skill and attitude. Researchers can also extend the approach to other courses and settings to build up the body of research in learning and skill development. Educational policy makers may consider promoting promising approaches to improve students’ quantitative skill development. They can also set a high standard for higher education institutions to assess students’ numeracy and problem-solving competencies. Employers will find college graduates bring to their initial positions the high levels of numeracy and problem-solving skills demanded for knowledge work to sustain business growth and innovation.
Social implications
As students’ numeracy and problem-solving skills are raised, they will develop an aptitude for quantitative-oriented coursework that equips them with the set of quantitative information-processing skills needed to succeed in the twenty-first century society and global economy.
Originality/value
The proposed approach provides a goal-oriented three-step process to improve learning by overcoming learning bottlenecks as constraints of a learning process. The integral focus on identifying learning bottlenecks, creating learning interventions and assessing learning outcomes in the proposed approach is instrumental in introducing manageable interventions to address challenges in student learning thereby elevating students’ numeracy and problem-solving competencies.