A study of transferable skills for Work based Learning (WBL) Assessment

Transferable skills are learnt abilities which are mainly acquired when experiencing work. University students have the opportunities to develop the knowledge and aptitude at work when they undertake WBL placement during their studies. There is a range of transferable skills which students may acquire at their placement settings. Assessing the achievement of students on practice learning based on the transferable skills is regarded as being complex and tedious due to the variability of placement settings. No attempt has been made in investigating whether these skills are assessable at practice settings. This study seeks to define a set of generic transferable skills that can be assessed during WBL practice. Quantitative technique was used involving the design of two questionnaires. One was administered to University of Mauritius students who have undertaken WBL practice and the other was slightly modified, destined to mentors who have supervised and assessed students at placement settings. To obtain a good representation of the student’s population, the sample considered was stratified over four Faculties. As for the mentors, probability sampling was considered. Findings revealed that transferable skills may be subject to formal assessment at practice settings. Hypothesis tested indicate that there was no significant difference among male and female as regards to the application of transferable skills for formal assessment. A list of core transferable skills that are assessable at any practice settings has been defined after taking into account their degree of being generic, extent of acquisition at work settings and their consideration for formal assessment. Both students and mentors assert that these transferable skills are accessible at work settings and require commitment and energy to be acquired successfully.