Abstract:

Improving the employability of graduates is a global priority area for the tertiary education sector. Like many other countries, the Australian Government and Universities are under pressure to improve their graduate outcomes. While there has been extensive research into what industry requires of graduates in the workplace, little research is available about computer science academics’ perceptions of graduate employability and how they feel it should be addressed in the curriculum and implemented. Computer Science and Information Technology are rapidly changing areas with widely varying expertise requirements. Teaching employability skills in this context can be difficult.

There is little agreement over what the term employability actually means, and whether it can be taught. There is also little clarity around the specific skills required by technology graduates. In this paper we present results of our study of 20 (3 female and 17 male) Computer Science and Information Technology academics’ perspectives of employability and the emphasis they give it in their courses and assessments. Findings highlight that while many of the academics believed they were imparting technical skills to their students, which are essential for their employment, they did not believe it was their job to actually teach employability skills. The discussion of the soft versus hard/technical skill made for a very interesting discussion. Data revealed that the majority of academics believed hard technical skills were more important than the soft skills. Limitations of the study and implications for future research will be discussed.

Keywords:

Employability, Computer Science Graduates, Skillset.