Smart Campus - Digitalisaatio ja kehittyvät teknologiat työssä ja oppimisessa
Keywords:
digitalisation, digital twin, higher education pedagogy, generic competencesAbstract
Institutions of vocational education and universities of applied sciences (UASs) aim to strengthen the development of work- and industry-oriented education by renewing equipment and applications for learning environments and adding modern technologies to teaching endeavours. Investments alone are not enough. In fact, an updated understanding of learning and pedagogical methods is required. Educational provisions should inspire and support individual learning opportunities during both studies and careers. Work-integrated pedagogy offers to inform and improve models in which universities and working-life partners create learning environments together to combine theory and practice. In this article, we examine the relevance and connection of working life with higher education from the perspectives of teachers, students, and working-life partners in new high-tech learning environments, which have been scarcely studied.
The research data were collected in 2021 and 2022 from three group interviews. Moreover, the research takes place in the multidisciplinary setting of the cyber-physical and hybrid learning environments at Oulu University of Applied Sciences. Through a theory-based content analysis, we map ways to strengthen the working life relevance of higher education, competence needs driven by digitalisation, and the development of generic skills during studies at UAS. As a result, we describe four key development perspectives: 1) digitalisation and developing technologies in learning; 2) curricula; 3) identified generic competences; and 4) competence development. Our results supplement previous research on continuous learning and digital learning environments and guide the planning of future education offerings.
