Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
Research output: Contribution to Journal/Magazine › Journal article › peer-review
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TY - JOUR
T1 - The contested curriculum
T2 - academic learning and employability in higher education
AU - Speight, Sarah
AU - Lackovic, Natasa
AU - Cooker, Lucy
PY - 2013/1/15
Y1 - 2013/1/15
N2 - This article explores the discourse of employability in higher education by investigating the understanding of different stakeholder groups (students, staff, employers) of the University of Nottingham (UK and China), and their fit to each other and to the educational literature. It finds that, while theories of life-long or life-wide learning position employability as an outcome of a holistic curriculum embracing both discipline and employability, stakeholders perceive learning for employability as a threat to disciplinary learning. The results suggest that to progress significant curriculum development in support of employability, a greater consensus of stakeholder views is needed with a deeper sympathy towards the integration of academic learning and employability. The article concludes with an assessment of the re-envisioning needed by Nottingham and other universities as they prepare students for an "employability" fit for purpose in a twenty-first century characterized by change and challenge.
AB - This article explores the discourse of employability in higher education by investigating the understanding of different stakeholder groups (students, staff, employers) of the University of Nottingham (UK and China), and their fit to each other and to the educational literature. It finds that, while theories of life-long or life-wide learning position employability as an outcome of a holistic curriculum embracing both discipline and employability, stakeholders perceive learning for employability as a threat to disciplinary learning. The results suggest that to progress significant curriculum development in support of employability, a greater consensus of stakeholder views is needed with a deeper sympathy towards the integration of academic learning and employability. The article concludes with an assessment of the re-envisioning needed by Nottingham and other universities as they prepare students for an "employability" fit for purpose in a twenty-first century characterized by change and challenge.
KW - employability
KW - curriculum design and development
KW - strategic planning
KW - undergraduate study
U2 - 10.1080/13583883.2012.756058
DO - 10.1080/13583883.2012.756058
M3 - Journal article
VL - 19
SP - 112
EP - 126
JO - Tertiary Education and Management
JF - Tertiary Education and Management
SN - 1358-3883
IS - 2
ER -