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There is a need for higher education to produce graduates who are motivated to transfer learning into the workplace. Motivated graduates are work-ready and associated with increased performance. Presently, the research field around motivation to transfer learning by students in higher education is not clear and is inconsistent.

This scoping review provides an overview of the characteristics of the literature, including key concepts, recommendations and gaps based on eight published articles on the motivation of students in higher education to transfer learning.

The results reflected a research field, which focused primarily on the influence of specific factors, namely student characteristics, educational design, the workplace environment, and on higher education students' motivation to transfer learning. The lack of a shared conceptual definition of motivation to transfer learning in higher education appears to influence the description of the results from the included studies. Most of the previous studies applied rigorous research designs.

This seemingly stunted research field related to higher education students' motivation to transfer learning needs to be amplified to influence the development of work-ready graduates from higher education. Approaches towards including all elements of motivation, expanding to other fields in higher education, including low-income countries, may be a proximal step in enhancing the trajectory of this research field.

This study investigated how behavioral and emotional forms of engagement are associated with faculty support and student-faculty interactions among engineering students.

Quantitative research methods were used to analyze survey data from 781 undergraduates in seven large undergraduate engineering courses. Linear hierarchical regression models were used to evaluate the relationships between demographics (gender, race/ethnicity, family education, US status and transfer status) and student engagement and between faculty behaviors and engagement.

Faculty support was consistently, significantly and positively linked to all forms of student engagement, while student-faculty interactions were significantly and positively linked to effort and positive emotional engagement and negatively linked to attention and (an absence of) negative emotional engagement. Gender, race/ethnicity, international student status and transfer status significantly predicted at least one form of engagement.

Although this was a single institution study and cross-sectional, the findings suggest that faculty support and student-faculty interactions, while important for engagement, have different effects on different types of students. Faculty and teacher professional development efforts should raise awareness of these differences in order to enhance diversity and inclusion in engineering courses and curricula at all levels.

The analysis of behavioral and emotional forms of engagement represents more of a motivational lens on engagement in contrast to the traditional focus on time-on-task or time spent in fruitful educational practices, as is the norm with much of the engagement literature in higher education.

This case study describe how Bahrain Polytechnic maintains academic quality while responding to students’ expectations that prior learning will be recognized in a competitive market. Although recognising prior learning is important for enhancing the student experience, Higher Education Institutions (HEI’s) need confidence in the quality of transferring students prior learning. Bahrain Polytechnic differ from other HEI’s in the Kingdom of Bahrain in that it delivers applied, professional and technical qualifications. Graduates are expected to be work-ready; confident and competent, aware of what is expected of them in the professional world, and able to perform to their full potential (Bahrain Polytechnic, 2017). Programmes, qualifications and courses, and the underlying methodology of how they are delivered are developed in consultation with businesses, industries, professions, international education and training institutions to ensure that Bahrain Polytechnic graduates meet the needs of the labour market, thus supplying Bahrain’s economy with a source of highly skilled graduates. This enforces the use of a unique teaching and learning philosophy represented in Problem-based Learning (PBL) (Bahrain Polytechnic, 2017). Therefore, Bahrain Polytechnic need to be very cautious when assessing any RPL application. This paper identifies student mobility and internationalization as important and legitimate issues for both individual institutions and for educational quality assurance bodies. It then focuses on the Bahrain Polytechnic’s approach in acknowledging students prior learning through formal education. Following significant internal consultation, Bahrain Polytechnic has developed a more robust process for awarding credits/ exemptions to students based on formal education in other approved HEI’s.

The purpose of this paper is to report on research findings from a teaching and learning intervention that explored whether undergraduate university students can be taught to articulate their employability skills effectively to prospective employers and to retain this ability post-course.

The study included 3,400 students in 44 courses at a large Canadian university. Stage 1 involved a course-level teaching and learning intervention with the experimental student group, which received employability skills articulation instruction. Stage 2 involved an online survey administered six months post-course to the experimental group and the control group. Both groups responded to two randomly generated questions using the Situation/Task, Actions, Result (STAR) format, a format that employers commonly rely on to assess job candidates’ employability skills. The researchers compared the survey responses from the experimental and control groups.

Survey results demonstrate that previous exposure to the STAR format was the only significant factor affecting students’ skills articulation ability. Year of study and program (co-operative or non-co-operative) did not influence articulation.

The findings suggest that universities should integrate institution-wide, course-level employability skills articulation assignments for students in all years of study and programs (co-op and non-co-op).

This research is novel because its study design combines practical, instructional design with empirical research of significant scope (institution-wide) and participant size (3,400 students), contributing quantitative evidence to the employability skills articulation discussion. By surveying students six months post-course, the study captures whether articulation instruction can be recalled, an ability of particular relevance for career preparedness.

For several decades, human and financial resources have been the focus of academic institutions in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics fields of study because of low matriculation and graduation involving diverse student populations. However, there is a paucity of research about pathways to doctoral-level education and completion for these underrepresented populations. The purpose of this paper is to explore conceptually how STEM doctoral programs can implement a critical multiculturalist framework to recruit, increase persistence and completion to abate the attrition rate of women and students of color in doctoral programs.

Through a critical multiculturalist framework, issues of access and attainment central to the pipeline of traditionally underrepresented populations in to the STEM fields are addressed in this paper in an effort to support equity and inclusion at the doctoral level. Approaching this issue through critical multiculturalism takes the issue of access and attainment beyond sheer numbers by addressing the limited opportunity of women and students of color to see themselves in graduate faculty within STEM.

This paper reviews literature regarding the STEM pipeline’s “glass ceiling” that exists at the graduate level for students from marginalized communities, including gender and race. This paper proposes a multicultural doctoral persistence model.

Despite the efforts of many institutions of higher education to diversify the STEM fields, a “glass ceiling” remains at the doctoral level. There appears to be a pipeline for women and minorities from K-12 to the undergraduate level, but the doctoral level has been largely left out of the conversation.

Few resources exist to incorporate principles of modular approach to course design. This research aimed to help instructors by presenting principles for practical and empirically informed modular course design in engineering education.

In the first phase, a systematic literature review was completed to identify categories addressing a modular course design. Search and screening procedures resulted in 33 qualifying articles describing the development of a modular course. In the second phase, 6 expert interviews were conducted to elaborate on the identified categories.

Guided by the interview results and the ADDIE (Analyze, Design, Develop, Implement, and Evaluate) course design model, the categories were compiled into six design principles. To present the design principles in relation to the guiding principles of modular approach, an overarching conceptual model was developed.

Here, we present our innovation; a foundation for an evidence-based systematic approach to modular course design. Implications have value for supporting flexibility and autonomy in learning.