Information Technology Graduates Research Articles

Employers Feedback on the Performance of the College of Computing Studies, Information and Communication Technology (CCSICT) Graduates

This study is an assessment of the employer’s feedback on the performance of College of Computing Studies, Information and Communication Technology (CCSICT) graduates in the workplace with respect to quality and quantity of work, job knowledge, and working relationships.
 The study used a descriptive research method utilizing the employers of employed graduates as key informants. The respondents were purposely chosen who are managers or supervisors of companies and institutions of the graduates. Data from the 98 employers were gathered using a survey questionnaire. Weighted mean, frequency count, percentage, and rank were used to interpret the result of the survey.
 Results showed that graduates are employed in the Information and Communication Technology (ICT) industry. This means that the graduates have jobs related to their course. The majority of employers who participated in the survey are from the private sector. Employers were very satisfied with the graduate's quality and quantity of work, job knowledge, and work relationship. The top attributes used to evaluate the graduates' performance were the quantity of work and the working relationships. The findings suggested putting emphasis on written and oral communication skills and improving networking, troubleshooting skills, and graphics and design skills.

Career Craft (A Student Training and Freelancing Platform)

As the world continues to rely on technology in all aspects of life, the demand for Information Technology graduates with sufficient background knowledge and necessary practical skills has never been higher. Computer science students are required to keep track of advancements and new trends in the field while maintaining good depth in present technologies. Unfortunately, many fresh graduates face significant challenges when entering the workforce, lacking practical experience and technical skills in the field. To mitigate this problem, students need more exposure to real-world experience and work in a job market environment. This paper presents the design and implementation of Career Craft, a platform that intends to enhance students’ programming and problem-solving skills by providing programming tasks that students compete to solve. Teachers develop and publish programing tasks and students solve them in order to gain points. A teacher is assigned as project manager and selects a group of students based on expertise and experience to develop the requested service. This exposes students to the real-world job environment and provides them with hands-on freelancing experience in these areas. By using the system, students can increase their employability by working as freelancers for clients. The system improves students' skills, increases their chances of employment, and increases their income, while helping clients obtain quality services.

Performance management and policy evaluation of information and communication technology graduate program for developing countries

As an educational aid, the Korean government has developed and funded a graduate-level global information telecommunications technology program (ITTP) for ICT officers in developing countries. Questions have arisen about whether the program can achieve its goals and obtain mutual benefits between Korea and participating nations. Using a total quality management (TQM) framework as a unique case analysis, we evaluated ITTP’s resources and performance from 2006 to 2014. Our results show that ITTP has focused on the quantitative promotion of students and alums from various countries and their learning of Korea-centric ICT, policies, and culture. In particular, the Korean government’s lax evaluation of ITTP performance has led to weak responsibility, ambiguous task identity, missed opportunities for self-improvement, and low participation among students and stakeholders. These findings highlight the need for graduate programs and their stakeholders to reinforce internal and external evaluations of the program’s performance and provide feedback for reciprocal development.

Exploratory Factor Analysis of Congolese Information Technology Graduates’ Employability: Towards Sustainable Employment

High unemployment rates in many developing countries have prompted research to focus on sustainability and inclusiveness of employment in line with the sustainable development goal target 8.6. The democratic republic of Congo (DRC) in sub-Saharan Africa experiences one of the highest youth unemployment rates owing to its long-term socio-political and economic instability. Qualitative and quantitative research studies have linked low employability of university-educated youth in the DRC to tribalism, corruption, and insecurity. The current study sought to identify contextual factors that predict employability of information technology (IT) graduates in the DRC. The study surveyed 355 graduates (274 male, 81 female) using 43 questionnaire. Bartlett test was 3,930.05 for Chi2 ( p-value = .000) and KMO test scored 0.68. McDonald’s Omega test of reliability of the instrument scored 0.77 with a total cumulative variance of 72.02%. Results of this study advance the conflict theory by pinpointing the true factors which influence the employability of IT graduates in unstable developing countries. This study has discovered that socio-political background of graduates, graduate academic competencies, graduate-employer relationship, and university employability strategies are the contextual factors that predict the employability of IT graduates in the DRC. The Cronbach’s Alpha test of reliability for the retained contextual factors scored .78, .75, .63, and .53, respectively.

Exploring digital competencies domain and elements for information technology graduates in Malaysia

<span lang="EN-US">This paper explores the reliability of an instrument to evaluate digital competencies domain and elements for polytechnics’ information technology (IT) graduates in Malaysia towards future industrial revolution using exploratory factor analysis (EFA). This study thereby obtained 146 items from the previous phase (industries experts’ interview) which was later developed according to the study’s objectives. Experts validated the items, and after that, a pilot study was executed with 102 randomly chosen Polytechnics’ IT lecturers from four Malaysian Polytechnics as the respondents for this study. Four domains had been decided which are Personal Effective Competencies, Functional Competencies, Essential Competencies, and Industrial Revolution 4.0 (4IR) Competencies. Elements for each domain were created using the EFA, in which internal reliability was achieved for all construct dimensions. There were 15 elements gained through EFA for those four domains.</span>

Does greater access to employees with information technology capability improve financial reporting quality?

AbstractAlthough information technology (IT) plays an essential role in financial reporting, many companies today lack sufficient human capabilities to utilize IT competently. We examine the association between a firm's access to IT‐capable labor and financial reporting quality (FRQ). We proxy for access to IT‐capable labor using workforce measures in the metropolitan statistical area (MSA) where the firm operates, including (1) the number of IT‐related college degrees relative to the total active workforce, (2) the level of education of IT graduates, (3) the income level of IT graduates, and (4) a composite measure. We find that firms in MSAs with a higher IT‐competent labor force are associated with fewer financial reporting misstatements and internal control issues. This study contributes to the emerging literature stream examining the influence of geographic labor characteristics on firm‐level outcomes and the research on the impact of IT capability on financial reporting processes. We also inform the current movement of integrating IT knowledge into the education curriculum.

Restructuring of Undergraduate Information Technology Curriculum in Fulfillment of SKKNI Industry 4.0 with an Independent Learning Campus Approach

Information technology has played an important role in the business and industrial environment. The suitability of the competence of graduates of information technology graduates and competency standards in the industry is a problem that is quite complicated to explore. The purpose of this study was to analyze the suitability of the undergraduate-level information technology curriculum with the competency map required by the industry which is always developing rapidly in the industrial era 4.0. This study also tries to recommend an information technology curriculum restructuring model with an independent campus learning approach. The method used in this study is a qualitative method with a traditional literature review approach that specifically analyzes documents in depth to gain new knowledge. The results of this study indicate that there is a large gap between the education process at the undergraduate level in the competencies students acquire and the occupations provided by industry which results in many undergraduate graduates not being absorbed by industry. The results of this study also show that the independent approach to independent campus learning is also not enough to bridge this gap because several stages do not go well. This study concludes that a comprehensive restructuring of the undergraduate curriculum is needed to obtain a curriculum that is good and adaptive to change.

Career choice for ICT among Liberian students: A multi-criteria decision-making study using analytical hierarchy process

Information and communication technology graduates are among the highly skilled, paid, and perceived as capable and credible professionals worldwide. This has resonated in significant growth in the number of students pursuing careers in ICT at various African institutions. These developments illustrate the importance of conducting research that will provide insights into specific influencing factors that may be associated with students' choices of careers in ICT. Such a study is particularly essential for Liberia, which is experiencing a boost in ICT-related investments. This study considers 182 Liberian students' career choices for ICT as a multi-criteria decision-making problem. The Analytical Hierarchy Process is employed to empirically study the relative significance of factors that affect students' choice of ICT. Three main themes and twelve sub-themes influencing students' career choices were identified. Pairwise comparisons revealed that even though family factors play crucial roles in influencing students’ career choices, overall analysis shows that students attach great importance to extrinsic factors such as financial remuneration when making ICT career choices. Students were also reported as giving high priorities to job security and access to jobs while giving lesser importance to the prestige attached to ICT careers. The findings are highly significant to the career choice literature because they provide practical implications that may be used by organizations and entities offering IT employment and colleges enrolling IT students.

A Framework to Enhance the International Competitive Advantage of Information Technology Graduates

The main objective of any educational institution is to provide its students with the best educational knowledge and experience so, they can be employed to meet the labor market demands. Due to the rapidly changing in the technology industry and the expanding need for information technology (IT) professionals. The mismatch between IT graduates and the needs of the labor market leads to their inability to employ and job misplacement. Therefore, this paper aims to identify the most significant factors affecting IT graduates' employability and their ability to compete in the local, regional, and international labor markets through a detailed literature review and by conducting two surveys, one for IT graduates and the other for IT employers. Then, data were collected and analyzed by Statistical Package for Social Sciences (SPSS) 28.0 to build our proposed framework which will integrate all factors and parties involved to enhance graduates’ employability to match the labor market demands. The proposed model will assist all parties in improving their plans for producing graduates who are skilled, knowledgeable, and meet the labor market demands.

An Inventory of Acquired Attributes of Graduates in a Higher Education Institution Versus Industry Required Attributes

<p style="text-align: justify;">COVID-19 has substantially affected the majority of work capabilities. Higher education is responsible for preparing graduates for employment and well-rounded individuals with varied talents. This study determined the acquired attributes of Bachelor of Science in Information Technology (BSIT) graduates and whether it is anchored to the required attributes by the industry. Descriptive and comparative research designs of the quantitative research method were used in this study. This study had two sets of participants. Data on acquired attributes were gathered from the BSIT graduates from 2017-2020 of the Private Higher Education Institution (HEI) in Santiago City, Philippines, who are presently employed. At the same time, required graduate attributes were provided by the representatives from the industry partners of the Private HEI. A total of 45 BSIT graduates and 26 companies participated in the study. Data were collected using a modified questionnaire through online surveys and drop and collect method. Through confirmatory factor analysis, mean scores, t-tests, and ANOVA, rankings, findings revealed the six-factor result, which tallies the latent variables used for this study. BSIT graduates confirmed that they acquired the necessary attributes to be competitive in the IT industry according to the prescribed attributes for BSIT graduates. The Graduates and the Industry agreed that Modern tool usage and resiliency are essential in these challenging times in the workplace. According to the findings, graduates' university-acquired skills and competencies considerably increased their opportunities in national and global markets and sectors, making them timely and relevant during COVID-19 and beyond.</p>

Predicting Employability of Congolese Information Technology Graduates Using Contextual Factors: Towards Sustainable Employability

Predicting employability in an unstable developing country requires the use of contextual factors as predictors and a suitable machine learning model capable of generalization. This study has discovered that parental financial stability, sociopolitical, relationship, academic, and strategic factors are the factors that can contextually predict the employability of information technology (IT) graduates in the democratic republic of Congo (DRC). A deep stacking predictive model was constructed using five different multilayer perceptron (MLP) sub models. The deep stacking model measured good performance (80% accuracy, 0.81 precision, 0.80 recall, 0.77 f1-score). All the individual models could not reach these performances with all the evaluation metrics used. Therefore, deep stacking was revealed to be the most suitable method for building a generalizable model to predict employability of IT graduates in the DRC. The authors estimate that the discovery of these contextual factors that predict IT graduates’ employability will help the DRC and other similar governments to develop strategies that mitigate unemployment, an important milestone to achievement of target 8.6 of the sustainable development goals.

Impact of COVID-19 on the Career Trajectories of Black, Indigenous, and Latinx IT Graduate Students and Professionals

This study utilizes an explanatory sequential mixed-methods design to examine the impact of COVID-19 on the career trajectories of information technology (I.T.) graduate students and professionals of color. Building on individual differences theory in the initial quantitative phase, data from a national survey of 356 STEM graduate students and professionals of color (Black, Indigenous, and Latino) were analyzed to investigate intersectional differences among I.T. and non-I.T. STEM graduate students and professionals by race/ethnicity, gender, and socio-economic characteristics. Findings suggest differential impacts of COVID-19 on I.T. graduate students and I.T. professionals. Among STEM graduate students, financial strain significantly affected their career plans, whereas among professionals, gender was a significant predictor. Qualitative evidence from I.T. respondents clarified quantitative findings. I.T. graduate students (n=239) were more concerned about research setbacks and career instability, while I.T. professionals (n=117) were concerned with setbacks in professional roles and networks, work/life stability, and increased desires for entrepreneurship.

Matching ICT Skills and Competency for Industry Employability: Basis for Curriculum Enhancement

The study evaluated the level of ICT skills and competencies needed by the industries from BS Information Technology graduates intended for curriculum enhancement in Zamboanga Peninsula Polytechnic State University. Academic and the Industry Sector assessed the needed competencies for an entry-level position in IT Department. More so, the study employed a descriptive-quantitative method and utilized weighted mean and T-test as statistical tools for analysis of data. Results revealed that both Industry and Academic sectors rated extremely required Technical Support Specialist, System Administrator, Web and Applications Developer, Network Engineer and Computer Programmer in the entry-level position in the IT Department. An expert level is necessary in terms of the competency in Managing Database System, Networking, and Programming both for Web and Computer as well as system design, analysis, administration, and maintenance. State Universities and Colleges (SUCs) and private Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) and the different industry sectors in the Zamboanga Peninsula have the same requirements in hiring BSIT graduates for entry-level positions that have acquired ICT skills as experts in their professional and common courses. Keywords: Information Technology, Curriculum, ICT Descriptive-Quantitative Analysis, Philippines

Employability Prediction of Information Technology Graduates using Machine Learning Algorithms

The ability to predict graduates’ employability to match labor market demands is crucial for any educational institution aiming to enhance students' performance and learning process as graduates’ employability is the metric of success for any higher education institution (HEI). Especially information technology (IT) graduates, due to the evolving demand for IT professionals increased in the current era. Job mismatch and unemployment remain major challenges and issues for educational institutions due to the various factors that influence graduates' employability to match labor market needs. Therefore, this paper aims to introduce a predictive model using machine learning (ML) algorithms to predict information technology graduates’ employability to match the labor market demands. Five machine learning classification algorithms were applied named Decision tree (DT), Gaussian Naïve Bayes (Gaussian NB), Logistic Regression (LR), Random Forest (RF), and Support Vector Machine (SVM). The dataset used in this study is collected based on a survey given to IT graduates and employers. The performance of the study is evaluated in terms of accuracy, precision, recall, and f1 score. The results showed that DT achieved the highest accuracy, and the second highest accuracy was achieved by LR and SVM.

Career Success Model: A Case Study of Information Technology Graduates

Success in a career is everyone's dream, and it is not an exception for Information Technology graduates who are engaged in information technology-related jobs. Several studies have documented the role of the following two (2) constructs, namely Career Competence (CC) and Lecturer Competence (LC), in Career Success (CS). The authors believe that University Commitment (UC) must be included in this list. This research aims at developing a model that explains and measures the relationship amongst those four (4) constructs. The model that will be developed is based on the Structural Equations Modelling Technique. Respondents participating in this research are IT graduates working in IT-related jobs who have graduated from three (3) private universities in Bandung (Indonesia), namely, Maranatha Christian University (UKM), Parahyangan Catholic University (UNPAR), and Harapan Bangsa Institute of Technology (ITHB)) with graduating years ranging from 2006 to 2018. The collected data will be processed using IBM SPSS AMOS. This research proves that firstly, LC influences both UC and CC, secondly, UC influences CC, and lastly, CC affects CS. Further hope this model can be developed for other universities in Indonesia to increase Lecture Competency and University Commitments by the strategic plans of each university.
 
 Respondents participating in this research are IT graduates working in IT-related jobs who have graduated from three (3) private universities in Bandung (Indonesia), namely, Maranatha Christian University (UKM), Parahyangan Catholic University (UNPAR), and Harapan Bangsa Institute of Technology (ITHB)) with graduating years range from 2006 to 2018. The collected data will be processed using IBM SPSS AMOS. This research proves that firstly, LC influences both UC and CC, secondly, UC influences CC, and lastly, CC affects CS. Further hope this model can be developed for other universities in Indonesia to increase Lecture Competency and University Commitments by the strategic plans of each university.
 
 Keywords— Department of Information Technology, Career Success, Commitment of Higher Education Lecturer Competency, Career Competence

Emotional Maturity and Employer Satisfaction

The present research study examines emotional maturity and its relationship with employer satisfaction in recruiting fresh engineering Information Technology graduates. Four hundred sixty-five employers of multinational and national information technology companies in India were considered as respondents. These employers conduct the campus placement drives in the public and private technical universities of India for the recruitment of fresh engineering graduates with specialization in information technology. The collected data was analyzed using structural equation modelling (SEM). Results revealed that all the four dimensions of emotional maturity are defined by emotional stability, emotional progression, social adjustment, and personality integration. Emotional maturity had a significant positive relationship with employer satisfaction. The study is useful for employers investing in India to recognize employability skills in young graduates. The findings of the study will also give insight to academicians to recognize the need for soft skills in their course curriculum.

Community of practice: converting IT graduate students into specialists via professional knowledge sharing

PurposeThe paper aims to highlight how an applied learning framework or “community of practice” (CoP) combined with a traditional theoretical course of study enables the identification of teaching-learning processes which facilitate knowledge transfer from practitioners to graduate information technology (IT) students for quicker integration in the labour market.Design/methodology/approachCoPs are identified based on cluster analysis according to Kolb’s Learning Style Inventory (1984), with data obtained through a survey. Empirical research is applied to the CoP developed within a non-formal learning framework, principal new actors being IT specialists linked to graduate IT students and teachers on a traditional university course. Graduate IT students can gain knowledge of the ideal employee and the social and emotional skills needed to integrate with the IT labour market.FindingsThe K-Means algorithm helps to identify clusters of graduate IT students displaying necessary knowledge acceptance behaviour to convert them into specialists. The results of the cluster analysis show different learning styles of the labour force, providing an overview of candidate selection methods and the knowledge, skills and attitudes expected by users.Research limitations/implicationsAlthough the research adds value to the existing literature on learning styles and the knowledge and core skills needed by IT specialists, it was limited to an emerging market.Originality/valueThe study provides a preliminary overview of graduate IT students’ attitudes from an emerging market to the re-engineering of academic learning contexts to facilitate professional knowledge transfer, converting them into IT practitioners and integrating them in the labour market of an emerging economy.

A Tracer Study on the Employability of Information Technology Graduates of Ilocos Sur Polytechnic State College, Tagudin Campus

The purpose of the study was to examine the employability of the Information Technology graduates of Ilocos Sur Polytechnic State College - Tagudin Campus in the Philippines. A survey questionnaire was administered to the graduates from the year 2012 to 2016 (n = 152). In general, about 53 percent of those who participated in the survey were employed while the rest were employed but stopped (26 percent) and never employed (21 percent). Although most of the graduates were employed, many of them are in jobs that are not related to their course. The main reasons identified for those who stopped from their work include end-of-contract, starting pay is too low, and plans to seek jobs abroad. The graduates' employment barriers include lack of work experience, professional eligibility, and intent to seek employment abroad. More than 50 percent recommended that the computer facilities used by the IT students should be upgraded to improve the employability of the IT graduates.

Identification of Factors Affecting the Employability of Information Technology Graduates

Graduate employability has been a typical subject among analysts, governments and advanced education frameworks around the globe uniquely in Sri Lanka but also in the world. In any case, while there is a ton of data and various models that advise on graduate employability, Specially what are the weak areas in the current education framework in universities (State and non state) the system change necessarily according to the industry requirements has been constrained exact research around there. Besides, most employability considers have been led in the Sri Lanka and different pieces of the world, In spite of Information Technology (IT) being one of the most looked for after capability by Sri Lankans, regardless it stays indistinct with respect to why numerous IT graduates battle to verify occupations after graduation.

A review on soft skills - an important key for employability in the "shift to a service driven economy" era

In recent times, the change from a manufacturing to a service economy has raised the importance of soft skills between graduates in general, and IT (Information Technology) in particular. Although market requires a decade ago were mostly centered on a candidate's specialist knowledge, there is now a greater emphasis on soft skills. Employers’ complaints about the dearth of soft skills among IT graduates prompted this study, which maps the true market soft-skills needs. A total of2000 IT classified adverts relating to IT experts were analyzed as part of the study. Human contact skills were found to be in high demand (41.2 percent of the soft skills ads), common (or general) skills were second (22.8 percent of the ads), task interaction was third (20.2 percent of the ads), and organizational skills were indeed the least sought (41.2 percent of the ads) (15.8%).