In this final theme, I explore the challenges experienced by academics, students and employers in developing employability skills and how these challenges might be addressed from now on.
The perspectives on employability skills from the views of stakeholders taking part in internships are critical for understanding the employability of graduates.
Hotel Employer 5:
“For, as we are hotels, many hotels take part in these internship programmes, so we must also take part in a designed a programme that fits what we offer in hotels. We want hands-on graduates. We could help in course design and the employability is that we need to graduate.
University has to appeal to employers for their collaboration. Our capacity and performance will boost up, and universities could recruit students for high calibre courses.”
From the above statements, employers expressed their wish to be part of the curriculum design process of the university curriculum to influence the academic aspects of what they require for employability. Employers wish, for a variety of reasons, to collaborate with academics on the organisation of internship in a more efficient manner. They expressed themselves in various
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ways. Employers wish to collaborate in the design of curricula and the recruitment of interns.
Other employers expressed their concern about their collaboration with academics. From the academic perspective, they have expressed challenges of curriculum change.
ICT Academic 4:
“We have been since then trying to rework the structure of the programme of our academic programme to match the criteria of employers, to match their demand.”
There are institutional challenges related to collaborating with industry in terms of curriculum changes. Institutions and industry are still at the trying to stage, suggesting that they cannot move beyond the intent phase of collaboration.
These quotes suggest that there may be challenges experienced by industries in influencing the curriculum of universities on the employability skills needed for a quality fit into the workplace.
Universities complained that various constraints are hindering them from following the pace of employers in terms of new technology and other advanced technical knowledge to be inculcated into graduates.
The limited-time that university staff comes to the worksite to collaborate with the mentors of students, in supporting and assessing the development of the student, is a challenge to the intention of internship programmes.
Hotel Employer 6:
“university and employer should collaborate in the internship programme. Universities should encourage employers to work on internship strategies.”
Collaboration between university academics and worksite managers need further development for the exploitation of the learning opportunities and foci of learning possible at worksites during internships. In most cases, the academic staff’s involvement in an internship is in search of opportunities for internships. This is where the collaboration ends. The collaboration needs to be extended into the expected learning for employability sphere. In this way, the beneficiaries will be the graduates, employers, and academics in these joint ventures. The joint participation of employers and academics is essential in internship preparation.
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Drawing from these above excerpts, there is a level of partnership between some employers and academics for the organisation and implementation of internships. Collaboration on skills development between universities and employers is worthwhile performing some useful complex skills. They require greater collaboration between industry and academics to identify skills sets. The industry may need to re-test their expectations of graduates when work experience opportunities outside of the classroom are not provided. Without close collaboration between industry and the educational institutions, their chances of aligning the curriculum and graduate outcomes with their present and future needs are slim. Some industry research participants suggested that their companies are exploring the viability of identifying proximate vocational and higher educational institutions. Proactive development of beneficial relationships would deliver “perpetual sources of skilled human resources” to meet their ongoing skills requirements.
Probing further on this issue, the above data revealed that employers are not satisfied with their participation in the internship programme. They complained of the weak interaction of universities in involving companies in certain aspects of their internships, where they could have been more active. For example, in the hotel and ICT sectors where there is severe competition, requiring many high-level skills. Employers find that the services and technology are transforming and that the curricula have to be dynamic and in line with the current development.
Not all internships lead to developing employability skills. For example, some employers use intern students/graduate to perform menial and routine work (during our work placement, we did photocopies, filing, and dispatch), while some students do not excel in their internship opportunities (students were at ease when performing some clerical works, but could not apply employability skills, such as communication when left on their own to talk to customers) (Finance Employer 2). This means that there are challenges in teaching and learning within internship programmes, either from the perspective of employers (who provide a low level of workplace engagement during the internship) or from the perspective of students, who, for different reasons (rate of pay during the internship; lack of interest in learning) do not use this learning space for optimal learning. Hence, one challenge of an internship is that of commitment to learning, or commitment to facilitate learning during internships.
Employers understand that academics are multiplying their efforts, at least, to keep pace with industries, by working in partnership with employers and by sending graduates on internships.
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From the data collected, another challenge faced by academics is a limitation on the academics’
side to carry out and to teach employability skills of graduates at the university level. They lack facilities, be it in the knowledge of new technology, and the tools and equipment associated to deliver the training programmes.
Hotel Academic 5:
“at the university, we cannot create a proper working environment. We are more concerned with the concept, the academic aspect of the occupation, whereas in hotels they are practising the authentic thing there with modern equipment and the latest available techniques. We cannot change our curriculum as quickly as employers do,”
Also, the physical structures of universities are not like that of companies, which have access to customers in a normal work environment. The theoretical part of employability skills may start at university. However, the true practical aspects of employability skills have to be implanted in a proper environment, for example, in a workplace, and on sites of work. Thus, academics consider internships as a working platform for students to cope with the missing part of the curricula.
The challenges met by employers and academics are many when organizing internship for developing employability skills in graduates for the workplace. However, the viewpoints on employability skills from the interpretations of stakeholders taking part in internships are critical for understanding the employability of graduates. The employers highlighted their difficulty in inserting new technological components in the curriculum, whereas academics argue that they have to implement a broad-based curriculum for a majority of employers. However, employers recognised that academics are doing their best to produce ready-made graduates at the end of their study. Both employers and academics agreed that the workplace is the proper environment for graduates to put into practice what they were taught in the classroom.
5.10 Concluding Comments on the Demands in Preparing Graduates for the