Developing employability skills through peer-assessment

Abstract

The development of employability skills is becoming an increasingly important topic in higher education today. According to Alsop (2015), graduates are deficient in key workplace skills such as oral communication, critical thinking and teamwork. Situation in Sri Lanka too is not different. Ariyawansa (2008) and Chandrakumara (2015) argue that graduates who pass out from Sri Lankan state universities do not have required professional skills such as communication, negotiation, interpersonal, teamwork, analytical and intellectual skills. Various programmes have been introduced to enhance the employability skills of the graduates. Learner-centred alternative assessment methods which are more integrated into teaching and learning have drawn much attention in the recent past due to various benefits they offer. Among the alternative assessment methods, peer – assessment has become popular in higher education at present. Peer-assessment not only creates a learner centred assessment method but also helps students develop various skills including employability skills. Drawing a sample of ninety-one (N-91) undegraduates from a humanities and social sciences faculty of a state university in Sri Lanka, the present study was conducted to examine the potential of peer-assessment to enhance the employability skills of the graduates. Learner perception about the potential of peer-assessment to enhance the employability skills was examined using a closed-ended questionnaire, open-ended questionnaire, focus group discussions, one-to-one interviews and written reflections. Participants of the present study generally held positive perception about peer-assessment and believed that peer-assessment helped them enhance various employability skills including teaching skills, independent evaluative skills, professional collaboration and teamwork, communication skills, negotiation skills, critical thinking skills and analytical skills. Therefore, this paper concludes that peer-assessment is an appropriate viable form of alternative assessment and recommends teachers, educators and material writers in higher education institutes to consider using learner centred peer-assessment in their courses in order to enhance the employability skills of the students.