APAcS Star: Promoting graduate employability traits
Ismail, P.M1, Yatim, N2, Alias, N3.
The issue of graduates' employability has become a growing
concern globally. With many graduates, but limited positions in the
workforce, it is imminent for graduates to possess employability traits.
Employers also expect the students to learn a multitude of skills and abilities,
on top of knowledge of accounting, while studying in the university. To
reduce this gap, a student development framework, the APAcS Star was
established. APAcS Star aims to bridge the gap by arming students with
essential interpersonal skills. Based on three core Skill Areas, namely
Critical Thinking, Communications and Leadership skills. APAcS Star is
executed by further breaking those Skill Area into Traits. These traits connote
an element of a Skill that, by mastering a number of those smaller Traits,
will lead to a mastery of the major Skill. All the Traits from the three Skill
Area are smartly placed in events, starting with ‘Knowledge Gaining’, then progressing to ‘Knowledge Applying’ and ‘knowledge Assessing’. In 2016, 31 students graduated with an APAcS Star certificate. In 2017 and 2018, the final assessment was further enhanced into two categories, the student respectively were awarded the APAcS Star Certificate. The APAcS Star Certificate increase the students’ chance of gaining employability upon graduation. In conclusion, this framework was able to assist the higher education provider to craft and develop a multitude of skills and abilities of its graduates, thus reducing the employability gap.
Affiliation:
- Universiti Teknologi MARA (Selangor) Kampus Shah Alam, Malaysia
- Universiti Teknologi MARA (Selangor) Kampus Shah Alam, Malaysia
- Universiti Teknologi MARA (Selangor) Kampus Shah Alam, Malaysia
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