Hi Edwin, Thanks for your post to the forum. The employers who hire our graduates emphasize the need for those skills also. Best wishes for continued success in your teaching career.
Susan Polick
It is important to assess general education skills to help them improve how they communicate with others and this is essential to their ability to advance in their chosen fields. As defined, communication is the process of transferring information, meaning, and understanding from sender to receiver. As important as it is for the instructor to be a good communicator it is his responsibility to help his students aspire the same level since the student will eventually become a teacher, mentor or leader in his field. I always give constructive feedback as to grammar, spelling and content on any turned in assignments. I want the students to communicate with me as they would their employer. I believe the goal of instruction is to create new leaders as well as provide the skills for reaching their goals.
These general education skills are the skills most sought-after by employers. While specific technical skills are important, if an employee cannot communicate, solve problems, interact with customers or take criticism effectively then the technical skills do not matter.
As college instructors we ought to make sure we are focusing our lessons on content mastery and basic employee skills together.
Hi Leslie, The employers who hire our graduates tell us exactly that! Too many students seem to lack those basic skills.
Susan Polick
In a career college we are very much focused on learning the skills necessary for the student's chosen career path. As teachers, we need to remember that those skills are not the only ones necessary to become and stay gainfully employed in ones chosen profession. We also have to focus on basic skills such as reading, writing, and doing basic math calculations. If a student/employee has trouble with these basic skills, they will have trouble communicating with others in the profession. Communication is key! So, as teachers, we need to make sure our students not only have the major skills they need for a career but also have the basic communication skills necessary to function and succeed in that career.
Hi MacDameon, Yes, the employers who hire our graduates emphasize that these skills are very important!
Susan Polick
I appreciate the invite to this forum Ms.Polick, lots of research has proven Jobs that have been lost are more likely due to ineffective communication skills, & personality issues,writing skills (memos,bulletins ect.) less likely to poor skill levels.
Because it will dictate the initial “starting place†for the course along with the ability to perhaps even “skim†over areas where the class (as a group) are already strong. For example, if a group of students come in strong with math skills than the instructor can concentrate more on another area.
General education skills are very important to have in my class since I cover a specialized field in healthcare. However, as an instructor in an accelerated program, there is little time available to help students who are lacking these skills. It takes time away from students who want instruction about the material in the course. I have read other remarks in this forum expressing this concern and it seems to be widespread. I do what I can, but I think that this is an issue career colleges that needs to examine, especially in their admissions standards.
Susan, these are the basic skills needed to move forward in life and employment, we need to get grasp on where our students fit and also what type of help they may need to succeed.
These skills need to be assessed in advance so that the instructor can make good judgment adjustments to the way the class is presented. If the class is very technically minded, then they will respond to a more technical presentation of the information rather than a standard less involved lecture. This will also identify special needs students that may require extra tutoring to keep them up to speed.
Richard
Hi Kristina, Thanks for your post to the forum. Absolutely! We need to know as much about our students' needs as possible. Best wishes for continued success in your teaching career.
Susan Polick
Assessing general education skills helps make instructors aware of student needs. It gives educators an opportunity to bring students up to speed and prepare them for success in future classes.
Hi Peggy, Thanks for your post to the forum. Unfortunately, this is a too common problem. The question is how much remediation we can do in the short time we have to work with these students?? Best wishes for continued success in your teaching career.
Susan Polick
Instructors need to know what level the student is on in reading and written communication. Our students have to pass a 3rd party test in order to work in their field and I find that students cannot understand words in the test questions. This effects their performance on the test. If they were assessed and could take classes to bring them up to where they need to be then we instructors could concentrate more on the subject matter we need to teach them. This is an accelerated program and we don't have a lot of time to work on skills the student should already know.
I think that a very important reason for doing the gen ed assessments or baseline assessments is an extremely important tool in planning your instruction methods and understanding how wide or narrow your focus or methods can be. If teaching technical skills and you know that there are lower levels of reading or written communication, maybe hands on, application based instruction is best IF it meets the objectives and nothing in the curriculum is lost by managing your classroom in that manner.
Hi Stephen, Thanks for your post to the forum. Yes, it can be very difficult for students who lack basic skills and as you say we need to do our best to offer mediation. Best wishes for continued success in your teaching career.
Susan Polick
The assessment of general education skills such as reading, writing, and math is important to instructors when designing activities and learning assessments for their class. You may need to review or teach some of those skills to help students understand or complete a learning unit.
All adult education, in my opinion, is made possible by prior learnings and experiences. Without the basic building blocks of reading ability, general education skills and shared common experiences, trying to further ones education is an excercise in futility. Establishing these general education skills is the job of the public school system which, also in my opinion, has done a right lousy job of it. Education should be taken away from the state and put back in the hands of local educators that answer to the parents of each student.
Hi Mariann, This is something we encounter too often! Unfortunately, there are limits to how much remediation we can offer in the short time they are our students.
Susan Polick
