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30/11/2017 Abstract Preview
https://iated.org/concrete2/abstract_preview.php?print=yes&abstract_id=63447 1/1
KEY SKILLS FOR THE STUDENTS OF TOMORROW: A CROSS-
SECTIONAL SURVEY AMONG SCHOOL TEACHERS AND
UNIVERSITY LECTURERS
N. Sansone, D. Cesareni, I. Bortolotti, D. Capaldi, M. Montanari, G. Ragone,
S. Lariccia
Sapienza University of Rome (ITALY)
nadia.sansone@uniroma1.it, donatella.cesareni@uniroma1.it,
ilaria.bortolotti@uniroma1.it, donatella.capaldi@uniroma1.it,
marco.montanari@uniroma1.it, giovanni.ragone@uniroma1.it,
stefano.lariccia@uniroma1.it
The survey here presented is part of the Horizon 2020 “Up2University” (Up2U) project, aiming at
bridging the gap between school and university by promoting learners’ acquisition of crucial skills
through formal and informal learning so to let them be successful and achieve challenging goals in
the modern-day knowledge and network society. After a thorough literature and recent
international policies review leading the authors to define the set of skills considered as the “must
have”, a choice was made to collect teachers’ opinions about this set and their possible
divergencies and suggestions, being school and university teachers the main recipients of the
Up2U project.
Specifically, a total amount of 60 skills was defined and grouped in 13 areas, in turn referring to
three macro-areas (media and information literacy – MIL-, cognitive skills, socio-relational skills).
Via closed items, we first asked teachers to declare how much students should possess each of
them so to be successful in college (Likert scale 1-5). A final open-ended question investigated
respondents’ opinion about the three most important things schools should do in order to prepare
their students more effectively for college or university.
131 school teachers and 173 university lectures from nine countries answered the questions.
Results revealed how both university and school teachers clearly understand that - to support
students in the transition- it is necessary to reform the teaching models and to promote specific
skills they themselves identify as critical. Particularly, school teachers put MILs ability at the top as
in the case of “evaluating information validity and credibility” (3,64). According to University
teachers, instead, character and socio-relational skills are much more relevant, in particular
“respecting others’ ideas” (3,40) and “collaborating to solve problems” (3,34). The contribution will
show differences in all the investigated areas, according to country and curricular subject. Also, by
integrating teachers’ opinions with the literature review, the Up2U skills have been defined, around
which to focus the further steps of the project.
Content analysis of the final open question led to the construction of a 11-Categories list of
“solutions/areas of improvement”. Particularly, University teachers’ response stresses as a crucial
point Promoting Up2U skills (67%) and Improving Teaching Learning methods (18%). School
teachers’ response stresses at the top: Improving Teaching Learning methods (17%), General
Recommendations (14%) and Promoting Up2U skills (14%). In this case too, the contribution will
give details about each of the categories, exploring teachers’ concrete suggestions.
The information and views gathered through these surveys are a valuable starting point for
defining the training and development priorities of teachers and students. We are however aware
of some methodological limits, mainly related to the sample not being equally representative of the
respondent countries, as well as numerically uneven between university and school. Yet, the
amount of data collected and the heterogeneity of the represented curricular areas could be seen
as a strength of this tool. Subsequent actions in the project are now being designed, including a
new version of the survey which will consider suggestions gathered from teachers and reflections
from researchers.
Keywords: skills, school, university, transition