“Graduate Attributes” is an umbrella term which refers to “not only subject knowledge but also academic skills and literacies (such as quantitative, language-related and information literacies), approaches to study, background or contextual knowledge required in different disciplines, and forms of social capital. The focus here is on its academic dimensions but it is clearly exacerbated by the social and cultural transition difficulties that many students experience on entering university” (Council for Higher Education, 2013, p. 62).
The lack of incoming and exiting graduate learners ‘owning’ these attributes is often seen as a discriminating reflection of both the perceived quality of Teaching and Learning, as well as suggesting the graduating learners’ ability to succeed in the workplace. It is suggested that developing these attributes is an important mechanism to develop the knowledge economy in SA today, and it may also contribute to the country’s global competitiveness.
Simply stating a finding in the report, ‘A proposal for undergraduate curriculum reform in South Africa: The case for a flexible curriculum structure’, the CHE says the transitional disjunction between secondary school and post secondary education levels of preparedness is not decreasing. The report describes this distance as a ‘gap, [which] can be closed from either side,’ whether by schools or from within post-secondary education and training institutions. Schools themselves face diverse challenges far beyond a simplified or narrowed focus on the learners who are released into post-secondary education and training institutions.
This PhD research project therefore aims to explore literacy development and “educational continuity between consecutive educational levels or phases, i.e. vertical articulation,” from within a Higher Education context. It seeks to move beyond a simple mapping of all of these challenges, however, and in this presentation includes initial efforts within a comprehensive university in South Africa, Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University (NMMU) to introduce engagements with Open Educational Resources as a tool to support developing learner literacy levels as stated in the institution’s Vision 2020 graduate profiling statement.
Particular focal areas are on unpacking what social and digital literacy development entails, and as during 2014 and 2015, foreground past and on-going efforts at Open Advocacy, as well as learnings from Open and Open Educational Resources awareness-raising interventions. These events took place over the course of the first 9 months of employment at NMMU between July 2015 and March 2015, and include participation in Global Open Education Week 2015, as well as advocacy and awareness-raising interventions for both staff and students at the institution, as presented by the researcher designation within the institution’s Centre for Teaching, Learning and Media (CTLM).
The research question asks: Can engagements with OER contribute to the development of social and digital literacies amongst undergraduate learners at NMMU? This presentation presents some initial experiences which may both inform and better suggest the research pathway lying ahead at the institution.