Basic literacy
Developing the skills, practices and knowledge of my discipline
- I can identify personal weaknesses in need of further development
- I can articulate my personal strengths and how these can be deployed in my career
- I can identify the knowledge, abilities and transferable skills I will develop in my degree
- To secure work in my discipline I will need to have graduate-level qualifications
- I expect to obtain graduate level work at the completion of my degree
- I am satisfied with my progress towards meeting my graduate career goals
- My degree program is preparing me to meet the needs of graduate life
Communicating and interacting with other people
- I can communicate my viewpoints with clarity and fluency in English
- I find it easy to listen to and understand what others are saying
- I find it easy to confront people’s problems to resolve conflicts
- I can use technology effectively to communicate with others
- I take care to use appropriate vocabulary and grammar when communicating with others
- I can gain support from others for recommendations and ideas
- I find it easy to persuade, convince or influence others
- I find it easy to quickly gain respect from others
- I usually show respect for the views and contributions of other team members
- I usually make a favourable first impression
- I find it easy to make clear, concise presentations to others
- I find it easy to communicate effectively with people from different cultures, backgrounds and authority levels
- I find it easy to get cooperation and support from others when working in a team
- I consult others and share my expertise and information
- I am able to build wide and effective networks of contacts to achieve my goals
- I seek to progress to roles of increased responsibility and influence
- I already have wide and effective networks of contacts to achieve my goals
Using digital technologies for my work and learning
- I am confident in my ability to use the digital technologies associated with my studies
- I am confident in my ability to learn how to use a new technology
- I use the Internet to gather reliable information about my future career
- I am confident in my ability to interpret large datasets
Rhetorical literacy
Solving problems and making decisions
- I make quick but clear decisions that spur others on towards action
- I can probe for further information to enhance my understanding of a problem
- I can structure information in a way that meets the needs of my audience
- I can initiate changes to make my work or life more satisfying and developmental
- I consider the complexities of the larger cultural, business and economic reality when approaching a problem or situation I offer unique and novel ideas that add new knowledge and insights to a problem or situation
- I am creative in achieving my goals by anticipating problems before they happen
- I usually set priorities with a proper sense of urgency and importance
Achieving goals, accomplishing tasks and meeting deadlines
- I spend a lot of time surfing the internet to find new information on search engines
- I usually set realistic goals
- I take action to achieve my goals
- I develop plans for specific goals and tasks
- I use time efficiently
- I find it easy to meet deadlines
- I can identify the resources needed to accomplish tasks
Personal and critical literacy
Career commitment
- Does thinking of yourself as a professional in your discipline help you to understand who you are?
- Does thinking of yourself as a professional in your discipline make you feel secure in your life?
- Does thinking of yourself as a professional in your discipline make you feel self-confident?
- Does thinking of yourself as a professional in your discipline make you feel confident about the future?
- If you could change your study major, would you do it?
- Do you ever think that choosing a different profession would make your life more interesting?
- Do you ever think that it would be better to prepare yourself for another profession?
- Are you considering the possibility of changing your university major in order to be able to practice another profession in the future?
Believing in myself
- On the whole, I am satisfied with myself
- At times I think I am pretty darn good
- I feel that I have a number of good qualities
- I am able to do things as well as most other people
- I feel I do have much to be proud of
- I really feel useful at times
- I feel that I’m a person of worth, or at least on an equal plane with others
- I think I have enough respect for myself
- All in all, I am inclined to feel that I am not a failure
- I take a positive attitude toward myself
Believing that I can complete my studies
I feel confident in my ability that I can:
- Ask questions in lectures
- Respond to questions asked in lectures
- Approach my lecturers to receive feedback
- Draw up a study plan
- Ask for help from my lecturers
- Source and write up additional notes
- Plan my time to revise effectively for exams
- Judge the standard to get good marks in my assignments
- Judge the standard to get good marks in my exams
- Respond to questions asked in tutorials
- Ask questions in tutorials
- Apply my knowledge to solve previously unseen questions
- Ask for help from my tutors
- Produce my best work in exams
- Make sense of theoretical aspects of my modules
- Engage in academic discussions with classmates
- Pass both accounting modules at the first attempt
- Make sense of feedback on my assignments
- Explain material to a friend
- Make a good attempt at tutorial questions in advance
- Answer an essay style question
- Study effectively on my own
- Follow and make sense of material covered in lectures
- Make sense of material I read in textbooks
- Ask for help from my classmates
- Meet the deadlines for my assignments
My ability and willingness to learn
- I follow up on goals, tasks and assignments to ensure successful completion
- I monitor my performance against deadlines and milestones
- I make sure that I keep myself up to date on technical knowledge and new developments in my field
- I am always on the lookout for ways to improve my knowledge and skills, and develop myself as a person
- I know how to ask the right questions to get needed information and to properly size up a situation
- I accept and tackle demanding goals with enthusiasm
- I make use of developmental or training opportunities to enhance my competencies, knowledge and skills
Putting the theory into practice
Please rate your ability to do the following:
- Judge the applicability of the knowledge gained in my studies to the workplace
- Apply knowledge and skills gained in my studies to the workplace
- Recognise and value the role of theoretical ideas in work or professional contexts
- Understand the relevance of each study unit (module) to my future career
Occupational literacy
Career exploration and awareness
How much confidence do you have in your ability to:
- figure out which career options could provide a good fit for your personality
- identify careers that best use your skills
- pick the best-fitting career option for you from a list of your ideal careers
- learn more about careers you might enjoy
- match your skills, values, and interests to relevant occupations
- make a well-informed choice about which career path to pursue
- learn more about jobs that could offer things that are important to you
- identify careers that best match your interests
Having a ‘plan B’ for my career
How much confidence do you have in your ability to:
- cope with the disappointment if your first choice does not work out
- manage negative feelings if your first choice does not work out and you need to find another career choice
- create a good back-up plan if you discover that you don’t have enough financial support to pursue your preferred career option
- develop a good alternative plan if you find that your access to your most preferred option is blocked for some reason
Emotional literacy
Recognising, understanding and managing how I feel
By looking at people’s facial expressions, I recognize the emotions they are experiencing.
- I am a rational person and I rarely, if ever, consult my feelings to make a decision (reverse score item1)
- I have a rich vocabulary to describe my emotions (reverse score item1)
- I have problems dealing with my feelings of anger
- When someone I know is in a bad mood, I can help the person calm down and feel better quickly
- I am aware of the nonverbal messages other people send
- When making decisions, I listen to my feelings to see if the decision feels right
- I could easily write a lot of synonyms for emotion words like happiness or sadness
- I can handle stressful situations without getting too nervous
- I know the strategies to make or improve other people’s moods
- I can tell when a person is lying to me by looking at his or her facial expression
- I am a rational person and don’t like to rely on my feelings to make decisions
- I have the vocabulary to describe how most emotions progress from simple to complex feelings
- I am able to handle most upsetting problems
- I am not very good at helping others to feel better when they are feeling down or angry (reverse score item)
- My quick impressions of what people are feeling are usually wrong (reverse score item1)
- My “feelings” vocabulary is probably better than most other persons’ “feelings” vocabularies
- I know how to keep calm in difficult or stressful situations
- I am the type of person to whom others go when they need help with a difficult situation
Ethical, cultural and social literacy
Taking the responsibility for my decisions and actions
- I accept responsibility for the results of my decisions and actions
- I personally take the credit or blame for the results of my work
Upholding ethical, responsible and culturally appropriate behaviour
- I uphold the ethics and values of my profession, community or workplace in all I do
- I encourage responsible behaviour towards the community and the environment
- I find it easy to provide direction to others, and to motivate and empower them
- I can effectively communicate with people of different cultural backgrounds
References
Byrne, M., Flood, B., & Griffin, J. (2014). Measuring the academic self-efficacy of first-year accounting students. Accounting Education, 23(5), 407-423. doi: 10.1080/09639284.2014.931240
Coetzee, M. (2014). Measuring student graduateness: Reliability and construct validity of the Graduate Skills and Attributes Scale. Higher Education Research & Development, 33(5), 887-902. doi: 10.1080/07294360.2014.890572
Lent, R. W., Ezeofor, I., Morrison, A., Penn, L. T., & Ireland, G. W. Applying the social cognitive model of career self-management to career exploration and decision-making. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 93(2016), 47-57.
Mancini, T., Caricati, L., Panari, C., & Tonarelli, A. (2015). Personal and social aspects of professional identity. An extension of Marcia’s identity status model applied to a sample of university students. Journal of Vocational Behavior, 89(2015), 140-150.
Rosenberg, M. (1965). Society and the adolescent self-image. Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press.
Smith, C., Ferns, S., & Russell, L. (2014). Conceptualising and measuring ‘employability’: Lessons from a national OLT project. Proceedings of the ACEN National Conference, Gold Coast 2014.