Work-integrated Learning Curriculum Research Articles

Reverse Thinking for Forward Learning: The Online Reverse Video Challenge as a Conceptual Alternative to Simulated Work-integrated Learning

The novel Coronavirus disease (COVID-10) which was declared a pandemic in March 2020 has disrupted learning programmes that rely extensively on work-integrated learning (WIL). This article reflects on the use of the 2016 online reverse video challenge as a remote learning alternative to WIL in the technical theatre stream of the Diploma in Performing Arts at the Tshwane University of Technology (TUT). A reversed intention practice-based assessment (or reverse video assessment) project was designed for the students to approximate the skills required for theatre technicians. This article is a conceptual exploration of the reverse video assessment design that involved exploring trends in reverse footage on online platforms and the professional practice of renowned South African artist and theatre maker, William Kentridge. The needs of contemporary South African students to be “tech-savvy” while faced with limited resources, was aligned with the requirements of the embedded simulated WIL curriculum. The reverse video assessment adopted a design research approach through the lens of play theory to conceptualise the edutainment approach to learning to relieve student anxiety during the pandemic. The assessment focused on three stages of development, namely, abstract thinking, three-dimensional object manipulation, and sequential organisation, which collectively result in a pragmatic creative process. The article will contribute to the remote learning body of knowledge which has come under greater focus during the pandemic. The ongoing pandemic necessitates a remote learning alternative to WIL to ensure continued learning without risking the health of students. The flexible nature of the reverse video assessment allows for the application thereof to different fields and levels of study

Developing a WIL curriculum for post-school lecturer qualifications

The South African Department of Higher Education and Training (DHET) published two policies in 2013 and 2015 respectively, on professional qualifications for lecturers at Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET) and at Adult and Community Education and Training (ACET) colleges. These policy frameworks require lecturers in TVET and ACET to complete work-integrated learning (WIL) in two settings: teaching (eg in classrooms, laboratories, workshops) and industry-based (eg factory, work sites, offices). Whereas the notion of industry and specialised workplace WIL for TVET and ACET lecturers was welcomed in certain circles, its inclusion in the ACET policy and the associated qualifications were not uniformly welcomed. Antagonism emerged primarily from some universities planning to offer ACET lecturer qualifications, ranging from insecurity about matters related to its implementation to outright rejection. This article draws on the theory of critical discourse analysis (CDA), reflecting on and debating the challenges that emerged during the development of the national curriculum frameworks for industry and the specialised workplace-based WIL component of the qualifications. Three discourses emerged: the first relates to a conflict between adult and community education with the discourse on industry-based WIL; a second relates to differences of opinion about what constitutes appropriate specialised workplace-based WIL for trainee ACET lecturers; and the third relates to the nature of ACET. It is argued that it differs from other forms of education and should not be subordinated to the ‘dictates of the state and capital’.

An Institutional Framework for Scaffolding Work-Integrated Learning Across a Degree

Work-Integrated Learning (WIL) is an important pedagogical strategy for developing employability skills by immersing students in real-world understandings, applications and practices. Increasingly, universities are focusing on how WIL can be scaffolded across a degree, to involve students in a variety of WIL activities in order to apply disciplinary knowledge and skills. While placement models appear to be the dominant mode of WIL that are easily recognised within a degree structure, non-placement forms of WIL while emerging, remain less visible. This conceptual paper presents an institutional framework that accounts for a range of placement and non-placement WIL activities, to make WIL practices overt across a degree. It introduces the Work-Integrated Learning Curriculum Classification (WILCC) Framework that supports a university-wide approach for developing, mapping and reporting WIL. The WILCC Framework promotes the visibility of WIL across the institution, offers a common language for WIL across disciplines, and provides a tool to scaffold WIL experiences throughout degree programs.

Does the timing of work integrated learning affect graduate employability outcomes?

Employability is a critical quality measure of student lifelong success that goes beyond grade achievement and often guides students’ choice of university and profession. Whilst studies highlighting the importance of work-integrated learning (WIL) in improving employability abound, there is a dearth of knowledge on the efficacy of timing of WIL as a variable in improving employability. The longitudinal study, carried out in a 3-year annual questionnaire-based survey, examines the effect of timing of WIL on employability status when student performance is held constant. Graduates possessing the same performance level (academic degree class 2.1) showed different levels of economic-engagement achievements depending on whether they engaged in WIL prior to their studies (Group A), throughout the learning period (Group B) or for nine months during the third year (Group C) of their studies. Although the findings revealed differences between timing of WIL and the nature of work engagement, all the graduates endorsed the critical role of WIL in building work-related competencies and thus improving employability. The findings are useful in promoting the necessary diversity in WIL curriculum design to facilitate quality and inclusive higher education.

Developing WIL curriculum which enhances hospitality students capabilities

PurposeTo satisfy multiple stakeholders’ employability goals, higher education providers have introduced Work Integrated Learning (WIL) programs to provide opportunities for students to develop the required skills. Yet despite this increased focus, gaps in graduate capabilities persist. Thus, the paper explores the roles of educators, industry and students in co-creating WIL curriculum which provides transformative learning experiences.Design/methodology/approachA survey was designed using the Professional Capability Framework which has been validated in other discipline areas. Mean scores, standard deviation and a one-way ANOVA test were computed to identify gaps between the essential capabilities required for supervisory roles and student's levels of proficiency.FindingsThe study highlights the complexity of creating curriculum which meets the needs of multiple stakeholders. The discussion highlights that whilst educators may lead the development of WIL curriculum, without the active engagement of students and industry, gaps in graduates' “work-readiness” will persist. Opportunities for tripartite learning are highlighted.Research limitations/implicationsThe limitations of utilising a convenience sample are acknowledged.Practical implicationsPractical recommendations are provided for industry, educators and students. Areas for future research are identified to understand the roles of multiple stakeholders in the development of the future hospitality workforces.Originality/valueThe study is the first to apply the Professional Capability Framework in a hospitality context. The study further contributes implications in relation to curriculum design and identifies opportunities for transformative learning for educators, industry and students'.

Fostering Self-Authorship Through Work Integrated Learning in University Tourism Programs: A Missed Opportunity?

ABSTRACT Work integrated learning (WIL), in its various forms, continues to be a central element of university tourism programs. Internships, the most common form of WIL, provide opportunities for both personal and professional development. This article presents findings of a content analysis of WIL programs in Australian tourism, hospitality and events (TH&E) undergraduate degrees. Publicly available unit/subject guides were gathered through an internet-based review. This analysis of secondary data identified that the majority of WIL curricula in the Australian university TH&E programs focus on career development, followed by academic achievement and thirdly, personal development. It is argued that the opportunity to facilitate students’ personal growth and the achievement of advanced learning outcomes through WIL is not being fully realized. Through the lens of ‘self-authorship’, meaning in this case, the student’s use of their internal voice to guide their beliefs, identity and relationships, this paper explores the opportunities for WIL programs to be (re)designed to meet industry needs while also facilitating the individual, personal development of future tourism, hospitality and events leaders.

A Model for Designing Authentic Learning

Student internships and work experience schemes provide students with highly authentic learning experiences (Bosco & Fern, 2014). Therefore many university programmes include a job-experience element that students must demonstrate completion of, usually through a report signed by the employer that the student has managed to find work with over their summer break. Auckland University of Technology provides a summer student scholarship scheme that provides contestable scholarship funding for students to work on university specified projects over the summer break. Each scholarship requires 370 hours of project-related work, followed by a summary report. In this presentation we explore a model that extends the summer student scholarship concept as part of a longer term collaboration between university students, academic supervisors, and industry representatives. This extended model brokers real world projects that benefit the wider community through developing solutions to health care problems in collaboration with a local district health board (ADHB or Auckland District Health Board). In this model communication design students apply to form design teams, selected and supervised by university academics, to address design briefs from the district health board’s Design Lab. Key aspects of this collaboration include: developing a sense of trust between the university and the district health Design Lab, establishing a supervision team and protocols, and establishing an ecology of supporting resources - including providing students with the work space and infrastructure access to achieve the project goals. The summer student scholarships are designed to be the first step in a long term collaboration that will potentially lead into major undergraduate student projects and post-graduate research. The summer scholarship projects use a Design Based Research (DBR) methodology (McKenney & Reeves, 2018) to address the first design stages of specific health care problems: analysis and exploration, and initial prototype design. The following stages of a DBR methodology (design implementation, evaluation, and redesign) are addressed through subsequent major student projects or post graduate research following agreement with the district health Design Lab after the presentation of the summer student scholarship project outcomes. The scope of the projects aim to explore the potential of wearable and mobile technologies to enhance health care practice and the patient experience (Rich & Miah, 2017). The research questions underpinning the extended student scholarship model are:
 
 
 In what scenarios can wearable and mobile technologies most effectively enhance health care practice and the patient experience?
 What are the design principles that can guide the development of authentic mobile learning collaborative student projects?
 
 References
 
 Bosco, A. M., & Fern, S. (2014). Embedding of authentic assessment in work-integrated learning curriculum. Asia-Pacific Journal of Cooperative Education, 15(4), 281-290.
 McKenney, S., & Reeves, T. C. (2018). Conducting educational design research: Routledge.
 Rich, E., & Miah, A. (2017). Mobile, wearable and ingestible health technologies: towards a critical research agenda. Health Sociology Review, 26(1), 84-97.

Good WIL hunting: Building capacity for curriculum re-design

In response to government, industry, student and central University calls for initiatives to enhance graduate employability as a means for improved employment outcomes, a faculty within an Australian university formulated a five-year Work Integrated Learning (WIL) strategy (2015-2019). The Faculty goal was to re-new, develop, implement and evaluate scalable and sustainable intentional WIL-focused authentic curricula across every undergraduate Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) course by the end of 2019. A ‘WIL Leadership Framework’ underpinned the whole-of-course team approach. This paper reports on the change-management processes and behaviours necessary to effect change from the bottom-up. Fostering academic staff capacity to build course-appropriate WIL curriculum has been slow and subtle and yet significant refinements to intentional and embedded WIL curriculum have occurred through a series of grounded research studies and curriculum renewal projects. WIL champions (the innovators), earmarked as change agents for enabling scalable curriculum transformation and renewal, were ‘hunted-out’ and nurtured. Their role was to influence teachers to enact context-specific and discipline-based WIL experiences into the curriculum. The main research findings to date reveal that STEM-specific WIL frameworks, concepts and assessment examples, presented as scholarly curriculum choices by WIL experts, and then actively and collegially discussed amongst the WIL champions and WIL early adopters, has been the most effective process to date for developing a WIL centred curriculum. The paper concludes by addressing the current operational goals predicated to have an impact on graduate employment for the Faculty.

Examining and challenging the intentions of work-integrated learning

PurposeWhile the intended outcomes of work-integrated learning (WIL) are well documented, significant challenges arise when the stakeholders have different understandings and expectations. The purpose of this paper is to examine the alignment of stakeholder views on the defining features of cooperative education as a model of WIL.Design/methodology/approachAn interpretive case-study methodology, incorporating questionnaires and semi-structured interviews, was used to determine the views of students, workplace supervisors and university academic supervisors involved in a sport cooperative education program.FindingsStudents, workplace supervisors and academic supervisors shared a perception that the students’ development of employability skills and their acquisition of experience in industry were the primary intended outcomes. As an associated benefit, students would be work-ready. Ideally, cooperative education experiences should also provide opportunities for students to learn to integrate theory and practice, further develop their personal and professional identities, and learn to navigate the important ethical aspects of being a professional.Practical implicationsWhile the employability emphasis in the findings aligns well with government agendas, graduates need to be prepared for complex and dynamic workplaces, and to be future ready for careers that are yet to exist. WIL curricula need to explicitly address this expanded agenda, which in turn needs to be communicated clearly to all stakeholders.Originality/valueThis paper challenges stakeholders in WIL to move beyond a focus on preparing students for the “now” and to reconsider the learning outcomes that should be imperative for university education in the twenty-first century.

Developing the Field of Work Integrated Learning (WIL) in Higher Education: A Curricular Approach

The goal of the research is to develop a unified description of the Work Integrated Learning (WIL) Curriculum and a cross-disciplinary curricular framework that identifies the elements and the relationships between them. This research combined scoping study and curriculum inquiry methods and featured three cycles of data analysis and two types of curriculum theorization. Data sources included a literature review, a survey, expert interviews, and a focus group. In theorizing the WIL Curriculum in higher education, the authors develop a definition of the WIL curriculum and on the basis of this definition, put forward a unified curricular framework, as recommended by Cooper et al. (2010). It begins with a WIL schema to provide an underlying organizational structure that outlines the relationships between fundamental actors and factors in the WIL Curriculum and describes twelve shared dimensions of WIL which are defined in relationship to their function in WIL curriculum development. The authors also propose a template for curriculum development in WIL and Community Service Learning (CSL). Finally, based on the data analysis and on patterns found to occur in the cross-disciplinary data, the authors developed eight curriculum models: Awareness, Application, Competency, Synthesis, Deconstruct-Reconstruct, Iterative Reflection, Research-Based, and Problem-Based Models. The WIL models that are advanced in this research provide a starting place for further inquiry, curriculum development and research.

Unpacking the learning–work nexus: ‘priming’ as lever for high-quality learning outcomes in work-integrated learning curricula

This paper describes the impacts of work-integrated learning (WIL) curriculum components on general employability skills – professional work-readiness, self-efficacy and team skills. Regression analyses emphasise the importance of the ‘authenticity’ of WIL placements for the development of these generic outcomes. Other curricula factors (alignment of learning activities and assessments with integrative learning, and the provision of supportive environments) also impact on generic outcomes. We explore three competing hypotheses for explaining the relationships between learning outcomes and authenticity on the one hand and the alignment of learning activities and assessments with integrative learning outcomes on the other: overlapping, proxy protective factor and mediation. We conclude that mediation is a plausible explanation for the observed relationships, based on an invocation of ‘availability heuristics’ and ‘priming’ to explain how these factors work together. Findings will have implications for the design and management of WIL curricula in universities.

WIL curriculum design and student learning: a structural model of their effects on student satisfaction

With the increasing adoption of work-integrated learning (WIL) as a feature of curricula, the idea of student satisfaction takes on a new dimension – students' experiences on placement are not routinely under the control of university academic staff, yet universities will ultimately be held responsible for the quality of students' placement experiences. In this study the satisfaction measures derived from multiple samples of students who have experienced placements are analysed. The analysis shows that satisfaction is bi-dimensional, as hypothesized, and that its sub-dimensions are each associated with different aspects of curriculum design and generic learning outcomes derived from the WIL placement. The findings have implications for the conduct and design of placements and for quality assurance measurement across the post-secondary and higher education sectors.

Partnerships between universities and workplaces: some challenges for work-integrated learning

Under contemporary highly competitive markets, organisations are demanding that any investment in learning be converted into productive outcomes that rapidly progress the organisation towards pre-defined strategic goals. A customised work-integrated learning curriculum has the potential to achieve such productive outcomes because it allows learners to quickly contextualise the study content within the socio-cultural and functional environment of the workplace. However, the development of a work-integrated learning curriculum relies on genuine partnerships between the universities and organisations. These types of partnerships require lengthy processes of negotiating the curriculum and pedagogies to support learning based in the workplace. Predictably, such partnerships challenge the traditional roles of the universities as transmitters of discipline specific knowledge and workplaces as less active partners in the learning processes and products. This paper is based on a case study and relates the challenges of developing a partnership, the transformed role of the academics and a more complex design and facilitation of the curriculum. What became evident was that such a partnership was problematic and demanded redistribution of knowledge-power relations between the university and the host organisation. The findings substantiate that successful work-integrated learning that meets the needs of individuals and their workplaces is premised on a learning partnership where the roles for the curriculum and pedagogy are genuinely shared. That such partnerships are integral to successful work-integrated learning and deeply problematic begs for more research to understand the dynamics and ways to approach learning partnerships between universities and organisations.