Enriching 21st century higher education students’ job creation skill : UTM academic staff perceptions toward MIT BLOSSOMS

Abstract

What are some generic skills or graduate student attributes required of 21st century higher education students by future employers? Besides English communication skill, team working skill as well as critical & problem solving skill, entrepreneurial skill is one of the generic skills that require serious attention in Malaysian universities. What are some characteristics of 21st century higher education students? What are some meaningful and interactive learning experiences that can equip them with these skills? Information and Communication Technology can be used to extend conventional teaching methods. Higher Education Institutions need to tap the potential and advantage of Information and Communication Technology towards engaging and enriching 21st century higher education students learning experiences. This paper thus attempts to explore the perceptions of UTM academic staff towards the use of an interactive learning environment - MIT BLOSSOMS - in enriching 21st century higher education students’ entrepreneurial skill specifically on job creation. In this study, 12 UTM academic staff volunteered to view an interactive video lesson from the MIT BLOSSOMS web site and later was interviewed how they perceive that particular video lesson will be able to help enrich entrepreneurial skill specifically on job creation among higher education students. Findings in this study showed that all 12 UTM academic staff participated in the study perceived that the video that they have viewed should be able to contribute in enriching 21st century higher education students’ entrepreneurial skill specifically on job creation.