FROM RESEARCH SKILLS TO RESEARCHER’S TRANSVERSAL COMPETENCE

Irena Zogla

doi:10.17770/er2021.1.5421

Abstract

Different intellectual traditions imbedded in cultural and education settings and theoretical approaches to the understanding of skills, competencies, and transversal skills bring about many uncertainties in the conceptualization of research skills and competencies; together with the social demands towards the quality of graduates' competencies these draw heavily on the changing process of education, quality of educational provision, and interferes with the quality of the graduates’ achievements. Doctoral students usually face a large number of theoretical sources to analyze and make an appropriate theoretical underpinning of research; they also have to meet the uncertainties, experience incompetence that interferes with the allocated time and quality of investigation. While the shift to competence approach in education is thus more complex than many accounts suggest, it does have major implications for important aspects of studies and educators' work. This article aims to initiate doctoral students' thinking of the cultural background of different intellectual traditions in education and identify the most appropriate theoretical sources for their research. The article does not, however, provide final definitions or completed ideas. Based on the experience of the most popular projects in skills’development and theoretical analysis the published considerations might trigger new problems for doctoral students’ investigation and start their navigation in the enormous pool of literature. The article introduces some approaches to understanding and defining research skills, researcher’s competencies, and researcher’s transversal competencies, their structure, and experiences of measuring.

Highlights

Different intellectual traditions imbedded in cultural and education settings and theoretical approaches to the understanding of skills, competencies, and transversal skills bring about many uncertainties in the conceptualization of research skills and competencies; together with the social demands towards the quality of graduates' competencies these draw heavily on the changing process of education, quality of educational provision, and interferes with the quality of the graduates’ achievements
This article is initiated by the findings of the project „Implementation of Transformative Digital Learning in Doctoral Program of Pedagogical Science in Latvia (DocTDLL; lzp2018/2-0180), based on the investigated additional theoretical sources dealing with skills and competencies, as well as the reflections on research experiences at different universities that follow different traditions, approaches, cultural contexts and definitions of research skills, researcher’s competencies, and researcher’s transversal skills/competencies
This article provides a short insight into the main components of the notions ‚research skills‘, ‚transversal skills', and ‚researcher's competence', as well as introduces different approaches to the definition of ‚researcher's transversal competence‘ to initiate doctoral students‘ research ideas, identify problems, as well as complete appropriate theoretical and empirical analysis

Summary

Ievads Introduction

Pētnieciskās prasmes un pētnieka caurviju kompetences (research skills, researcher’s transversal competence) vienota definīcija nav atrodama. 2018) un Eiropas Komisija (EC, 2016) precizē 21.gadsimtam atbilstīgas, spēcīgas prasmes (powerful skills), un to apraksts liecina par kvalitatīvi augstāka līmeņa sasnieguma, proti, kompetences nepieciešamību. Jaunākās publikācijas iepazīstina ar plašu zinātniskās domāšanas teoriju augstākajai izglītībai, bet augstākās pakāpes domāšanas spējas iesaka vērtēt kā zinātniskās domāšanas prasmes (Murtonen & Balloo, 2019); šo spēcīgo un saturā apjomīgo prasmi būtu lietderīgi dēvēt par pētnieka zinātniskās domāšanas kompetenci. Raksta pamatā ir teorētisks pētījums par pētnieciskās caurviju prasmes (skills) un ar to saistītu jēdzienu attīstības tendencēm pētnieka caurviju kompetences apzināšanai, kas varētu palīdzēt doktorantiem radīt idejas pētījumiem. Universitātēm ir nepieciešama paradigmu maiņa, īpaši otrā uzdevuma izpildei, jo informācija vēl nav zināšanas, kamēr cilvēks to neapstrādā, lai saprastu, arī zināšanas ir tikai nedaudz vairāk par faktiem, kamēr tās netiek interpretētas ar saprātu un gudri izmantotas. Tagad pētniekiem ir jāliek lietā domas elastīgums, demonstrējot veiklību un gudrību izmantot pandēmijas krīzi drīzāk kā iespēju, nekā apdraudējumu (Ling, 2020)

Par prasmes un kompetences kvalitāti About Quality of Skills and Competencies

Secinājumi Conclusions

Summary

Literatūra References