Learning Design for Future Skills Development in Small State Contexts

Abstract

The small Southern African states of Mauritius and Eswatini, with respect to their high levels of digital literacy and telecommunications infrastructure, have great potential for meeting future challenges as regards capacity building and developing a globalized workforce. However, the weaknesses of a decoupled University-Industry R&D collaboration, low-level business sophistication, a lack of appropriate knowledge workers, and manifest skills mismatches could create a difficult future for university graduates in these two countries. Within an African context, and with heavy reliance on imported and globalized products and resources, there is a common need for building resilience, self-efficacy, intra- and entrepreneurial skills, emotional intelligence, and growth mindsets as essential competencies for our future “peopleware”, as opposed to hardware and software. This concept, made popular by Lister and DeMarco, in the context of increasing digitization, brings back the softer and more discerning human elements in times where algorithms are increasingly making decisions and influencing our behavior. This chapter presents an attempt to equip recently graduated young citizens with a set of transdisciplinary skills and competencies which can build the above-mentioned important attributes and values along with the depth of academic knowledge gained at the university. As small state developing countries with colonial backgrounds, our strong sense of community, togetherness, resilience, faith, and tolerance should permeate within our intellectual siege.

1 Introduction

The small Southern African states of Mauritius and Eswatini, with respect to their high levels of digital literacy and telecommunications infrastructure, have great potential for meeting future challenges as regards capacity building and developing a globalized workforce. However, the weaknesses of a decoupled University-Industry R&D collaboration, low-level business sophistication, a lack of appropriate knowledge workers, and manifest skills mismatches could create a difficult future for university graduates in these two countries. Within an African context, and with heavy reliance on imported and globalized products and resources, there is a common need for building resilience, self-efficacy, intra- and entrepreneurial skills, emotional intelligence, and growth mindsets as essential competencies for our future “peopleware”, as opposed to hardware and software. This concept, made popular by Lister and DeMarco (1999), in the context of increasing digitization, brings back the softer and more discerning human elements in times where algorithms are increasingly making decisions and influencing our behavior. This chapter presents an attempt to equip recently graduated young citizens with a set of transdisciplinary skills and competencies which can build the above-mentioned important attributes and values along with the depth of academic knowledge gained at the university. As small state developing countries with colonial backgrounds, our strong sense of community, togetherness, resilience, faith, and tolerance should permeate within our intellectual siege. The chapter starts from a general overview of the contexts of both studied countries, and details the concept of Future Skills, before describing the study undertaken.

This action research study proposes an innovative approach to embedding Future Skills within university graduates in a developing country context. Our research focuses on how developing-state universities can breed more innovative and resilient workforces for a thriving and balanced work-life. What types of teaching and learning relationships and actionable strategies should we invest in for developing Future Skills for our graduates? We start with providing a background of the innovative stances of our two countries, and the disparities in terms of skills mismatch and areas where we should focus our policies and higher-education teaching and learning strategies. In the next section, we talk of the Future Skills requirements for a just, resilient, and eco-aware workforce, with increasing demands for better work-life balances as a result of the Covid-19 pandemic where our life priorities drastically changed. The third section then brings in the concept of transdisciplinarity, whereby in order to thrive in the future world, we need to be breaking down the silos created in higher education and get our graduates to cross-fertilize ideas, cultures and innovative creations. The fourth section proposes a pedagogical framework as well as learning design approaches to embed transdisciplinary skills and competencies within a university co-created module. In the fifth section, we describe the methodology for gathering information from students who had experienced the module as well as having a discussion with the academics to engage with them on the transdisciplinary competencies acquired by the students during the learning activities. The sixth section presents the findings from the focus group discussions and interviews with students. We conclude this book chapter with challenges and future research for developing transdisciplinary skills and competencies in the small country contexts. With a lack of critical mass and opportunities for wide scale research, we should be able to learn from collaborating with each other to find common areas for developing our graduates with Future Skills.

2 Small States Contexts—Potentials and Pitfalls

Mauritius is a rapidly developing Small Island State with a stable population of around 1.4 million inhabitants, banking on its natural beauty, stable political environment, and resourceful human resources for emerging into a high-income nation. The people of Mauritius value education highly and are fortunate to have free state-supported education from pre-primary up to university level. Higher education (HE) and even transportation to educational institutions are free for full-time students, and one of the political manifestos for the elections was to have “one graduate per household”. Out of 132 countries, Mauritius is ranked 52^nd within high income groups on the Global Innovation Index (GII 2021) in the following categories: Institutions (Rank 21), Infrastructure (Rank 65) and Creative outputs (Rank 31) (Dutta et al., 2021). Figure 14.1 depicts that Mauritius is thus at par with high-income economies in these three categories, but shows weaknesses in knowledge production, namely for higher education-related indices and development of relevant knowledge workers. Another study reports that the main cause of skills mismatch put forward by stakeholders in Mauritius is “a misalignment between university/educational institution curricula and industry requirements that is a disconnect between the education system of the country and the needs of the economy” (Tandrayen-Ragoobur, 2020, p. 95). Her findings correspond with the World Intellectual Property Organization (Dutta et al., 2021) reports of low ranking for Mauritius in knowledge-specific indicators: Knowledge workers (GII Rank 110); University-Industry R&D collaboration (GII rank 109); Business sophistication (GII rank 111). This shows weaknesses in the transitions from secondary/tertiary education to the world of work and lack of coherent guidance and policies for career mapping, succession planning and sustainable development.

Fig. 14.1

Global Innovation Index showing strengths and weaknesses for Mauritius (Dutta et al., 2021)

Another Small State in the SADC (Southern African Development Community) region is the Kingdom of Eswatini. It is not an island in the geographical sense of the word, but it remains fairly isolated, especially as it is located between South Africa and Mozambique. Eswatini’s population stood at 1,148,130 in 2019. It has a primary net enrolment rate of 82.5% in 2017 and a secondary school completion rate of 41.7% in 2015 (Commonwealth of Learning, 2021). Like Mauritius, Eswatini is part of the Commonwealth of Learning’s VUSSC (Virtual University for Small States of the Commonwealth) program. Primary school children benefit from free education, but secondary and tertiary education come at a cost to parents or education-seeking individuals themselves. Internet connectivity is available to 30% in 2017 of the population, and mobile-cellular subscriptions are at 94 per 100 people. Infrastructure is available for distance and technology-enabled learning and for expanding access to education and training in Eswatini. The Ministry of Education and Training’s National Education and Training Sector Improvement Programme 2018/19—2020/21 intends to place a greater emphasis on teaching ICT as a subject and using ICT in education (Ministry of Education & Training, 2018).

For the sake of comparison, Mauritius and Eswatini are interesting cases as both have good technology infrastructure, having a positive impact on the ability to familiarize with the internet and digital devices as important indicators and enablers of digital literacy as per Fig. 14.2. Both Mauritius and Eswatini are open to collaboration and, in August 2018, the World Bank Board of Directors took note of the good progress made of The Country Partnership Strategy 2015–2018 for Eswatini and thus extended the ongoing projects and advisory service for another two years, until 2020, focusing on two program pillars: (i) promoting growth and productivity, and (ii) strengthening state capabilities. However, the rate of development for both countries is not the same. The unemployment rate for Mauritius in 2020 was 7.11% and that of Eswatini was 23.4% for respective working-age populations of 607,122 (18–64-year olds) to 482,400 for Eswatini. Also, for the year 2021, Eswatini does not appear on the Global Innovation Index. This comparative study thus helps to determine areas for collaboration and knowledge-sharing to mutually mitigate the weaknesses for both the countries and provide custom-designed graduate development training that is tailored to individual needs.

Fig. 14.2

(Modified from Krönke, 2020)

Technology Infrastructure 2016–2018.

This study responds to the following research questions:

• 1. How can developing-state universities breed more innovative and resilient workforces for a thriving and balanced work-life?

• 2. What types of teaching and learning relationships and actionable strategies should we invest in for developing Future Skills for our graduates?

Fig. 14.2 shows the level of technology infrastructure and indicates the technological proximity of Mauritius and Eswatini for development prior to Covid 19. While Mauritius has a vibrant and fast-developing infrastructure, especially relating to modern transportation and commercial buildings and centers, Eswatini faces more challenges owing to its low employment to population ranking—145th of the 150 country listings—and negative international student mobility at -34.4 (UNDP).

We thus find that both Mauritius and Eswatini have adequate infrastructure but lack the developing professional competencies for their future workforce. However, they understand the importance of focusing on a globally connected and needs-based human development for a more sustainable and resilient future (Ferreira-Meyers et al., 2022; Krönke, 2020). In the next section, we focus on the literature and recommendations for the future workforce for both Mauritius and Eswatini. We propose a framework for the development of transdisciplinary competencies based on innovative approaches for co-creation and student ownership.

3 Future Skills for a Resilient Workforce

Studies with respect to Future Skills required regularly conducted in Mauritius (Armoogum et al., 2016; Dubois & Juwaheer, 2012; Hardin-Ramanan et al., 2019) and the Human Resources Development Council (HRDC, 2021) revealed that students were less interested in Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) subjects. These studies predict a mismatch in what would be required for the future workforce in Mauritius—namely higher-order thinking skills, problem solving and creativity amongst others. van Velsor and Wright (2012) had already identified specific transferable skills such as problem-solving, leadership, teamwork, empathy, and social/emotional intelligence, which were still being left out of the curricula of most higher education institutions (HEI), thus contributing to the widening of the skills gap. The Deloitte report on The Future of the Workforce—Critical drivers and challenges (Schwartz et al., 2016) reveals the pitfalls of focusing extensively on STEM. In the UK and Australia, this has resulted in higher unemployment rates compared to non-STEM graduates. Also, this extensive STEM focus might obliterate the more important perspective of quality education. Schwartz et al. believe that the STEM hype should be reassessed and improving technological infrastructure and connectivity, teacher quality, and digital literacy should be re-centered as key success factors for the future workforce. It should be noted, therefore, that focusing on STEM is a narrow viewpoint, since, arguably, “It is about balance: technical skills are not sufficient by themselves” (p. 9). Research shows that, increasingly, the focus on Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics (STEAM) or Science, Technology, Relationships, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics (STREAM) and other STEM variants are now shifting the paradigm to include more relationship-building or the arts and social science disciplines.

Kelly et al. (2022) pragmatically respond to the Covid-19 pandemic and propose that universities should consider how the pandemic has altered the world of work and that students should be assessed for more authentic, collaborative, and real-life case studies that offer opportunities to build professional resilience in the face of future uncertainty. Linking this to sustainability, the International Labour Organisation (ILO) published a report on the importance of Green Skills as essential for the diversification of the Mauritian economy (ILO, 2018) with main growth sectors identified as agriculture, manufacturing, tourism and energy. A green economy is one that results in improved human well-being and social equity, while significantly reducing environmental risks and ecological scarcities (UNEP, 2011). Green jobs are defined by the ILO as any decent job that contributes to preserving or restoring the quality of the environment, leading to environmentally, economically, and socially sustainable enterprises and economies.

The emphasis on greening the economy and its intricate link to sustainable development is a major priority for our developing Small States. The ILO report also encourages Mauritius to engage in “smart cities and ocean economy as two emerging sectors together with climate change adaptation projects that cut across several economic sectors” (p. 18) within the greening and sustainable development programs of the government. However, in these specific sectors, it has to be noted that probably owing to high specialization and lack of critical mass, skills related to sea-bed exploration for hydrocarbons, deep ocean water applications, marine renewable energies, for instance, are still in a state of uncertainty and there is at present no major move to offer a wide range of training in ocean-based teaching and learning activities, or Smart City planning and development, other than conventional and existing types of skills development. It would be more reasonable therefore to follow Schwartz et al.’s (2016) argument for a dynamic workforce that can constantly upskill and reskill, and enable innovation and workforce inclusiveness.

As noted in the Commonwealth of Learning (Commonwealth of Learning, 2021) country report, the Kingdom of Eswatini is a Small State with a primary school net enrolment rate of 82.5% (2017) and a secondary school completion rate of more than 40%. The University of Eswatini (UNESWA) offers degrees in agriculture, commerce, education, health sciences, humanities, sciences and social sciences and incorporates the Institute of Distance Education (IDE). The institute’s mission is to increase access to tertiary education by providing demand-driven educational and training opportunities to individuals, offering quality courses using the distance education delivery mode.

Some research has been done on the concept of Future Skills in Eswatini and its possible impact on the educational sector. Gama and Edoun (2020) sought the relationship between Graduate Trainee Programs (GTP) and Talent Management (TM) in corporate organizations in Eswatini and posit that more research and focus is required since the resource-intensive administration of both these programs lack coherence and integration with each other. Another gap in skills development was revealed by Brixiová and Kangoye (2018) suggesting that entrepreneurial training programs in Eswatini and elsewhere could be more effective if they were better targeted to women’s needs and in particular encompass soft skills such as confidence-building to address social-cultural barriers. Peppler (2013) links STEAM to cross-disciplinary education for a program in e-textiles and posits that “the creative problem solving, flexible thinking, and risk taking integral to e-textile design are ideal by-products of a STEAM-powered approach to education, which aims to balance technical expertise with artistic vision” (p. 39). By appealing especially to young girls and women, e-textiles offer a compelling medium to broaden participation in computing. Another area where coaching and life skills’ development in Eswatini are discussed is that of sports (Huysmans et al., 2022). Also, Dulvy (2020) affirms that Technical and Vocational Education and Training (TVET), and post-primary skills training more broadly, is a largely unregulated sector which lacks sufficient coordination in Eswatini. The skills training sector is not sufficiently guided by labor market needs, and there are no system-level institutions to encourage linkages between training providers and employers. In the World Bank development project on “Strengthening Education and Skills Training Systems to Support Human Capital Development in Eswatini”, Dulvy proposes that the project should support a selected number of training institutions, in collaboration with the private sector, to review and update existing programs or develop new ones to impart to trainees the competencies (which would include digital skills, green skills and other non-cognitive skills) identified within the occupational standards.

To summarize, we find that, for both Eswatini and Mauritius, there is a need to rethink our program offerings in HEIs to include graduate skills for more equal, equitable, ecological, and economical sustainability. In particular, we think that the Future Skills required for our graduates should be in line with the current government strategies, with a strong emphasis on the Sustainable Development Goals. For Mauritius and Eswatini, both hard and soft skills will be required. However, while the universities are innovating with more technology-based degree courses at post-graduate level, we need to also provide our undergraduate students with more transdisciplinary skills where they can collaborate, co-create and contribute with more dynamism, resilience and inclusiveness (empathy). We thus see the co-creation process as imperative to both develop and define the more important Future Skills for our developing countries. Our definition of Future Skills would thus be characteristic of our people, especially as our environments and technology are rapidly changing. We need, therefore, to give more importance in the curriculum to Digital Literacies, Green Skills, and how to forge ethical relationships within the world of work and Higher Education. It is also difficult to pin down an actual definition of Future Skills, given the fast pace at which our environments are changing, but we can work towards building the right mindsets so that our graduates can thrive in a very uncertain future. For the purpose of this chapter, we would want to define Future Skills as to include not only knowledge and competencies, but also thought processes, values, attitudes and empathy so that we can nurture well-rounded fully-fledged citizens who can collaboratively and confidently address future challenges.

4 Countering Vulnerability with Transdisciplinarity, Visibility and Resilience

The future is transdisciplinary. Future Skills should thus comprise competencies, values and thought processes which enable graduates to be at least aware, if not totally cognizant, of impacts of other disciplines on their own. The world is increasingly complex, interdependent, and interconnected—with “wicked” problems that need concerted efforts and skills to be resolved (Kłeczek et al., 2020). The more we delve into real-world problems and challenges, the more we realize that working in silos, continuously engaging with people from our own disciplines, and not connecting our students with students from other departments is a grave lacuna in our higher education system. Indeed, the transdisciplinary approach is important to address the challenges in society; the industry also requires graduates to become transdisciplinary specialists (Walther et al., 2017).

It would seem that it was Jean Piaget who coined “transdisciplinarity” so as to transcend the established framework of traditional academic disciplines and encourage freedom of thinking (Nicolescu, 2005). Piaget (1972) advocated for the unity of knowledge beyond disciplines, and his approach implies full interaction between, among, and beyond disciplines from a real-life problem-based perspective. The definition of the term transdisciplinary, however, is still in a constant state of flux (Mokiy, 2019). Nevertheless, we understand the term to refer to ‘trans-sector solution finding’ that focuses on the study of mega- and complex problems drawing on the mix of expertise and experiences from different disciplines and sectors of society, companies and stakeholders (Repko, 2012).

The diagram proposed by Jahn and his colleagues (2012), and reproduced below (Fig. 14.3), is useful as it shows the link between societal and scientific praxis that happens through transdisciplinary integration. A feedback mechanism allows for interdisciplinary knowledge sharing, which combines and integrates knowledge from both social and natural sciences, to influence social and scientific discourses. This knowledge will in turn consider both societal and scientific problems to define a common research object. This nexus approach is also based on the premises that both scientific and practical knowledge are equally valid.

Fig. 14.3

The integration of societal and scientific praxis in transdisciplinary research. Reprinted with permission from Jahn et al., (2012, p. 8)

Correspondingly, as we move from STEM to STEAM (Science, Technology, Engineering, Arts, Mathematics), and ultimately STREAM (Science, Technology, Relationships, Engineering, Arts & Mathematics), thus adding the Creative and Humanities aspects with more empathy, this chapter proposes a transdisciplinary approach for developing Future Skills for our undergraduate students. As Haugen (2020) argues, we need to bring learners to explore relationships that we have with our peers and our environment, which is why there’s a need to involve children as early as possible in STREAM and to make a profound impact by grounding our teaching and support for children in the context of really seeing children, getting curious with them, and valuing their ideas. The impetus for developing such a transdisciplinary course stems from the multiple reports from Industry-Academia instances elaborating on the need for developing “softer” skills for our graduates. As a universal feature, while university graduates have “savoir-faire”, they lack “faire-savoir”—roughly translated as the ability to let others know, be more visible about their knowledge, their core competencies and their personal strengths, thus needing to develop stronger relationships with their stakeholders.

As the future cannot be tackled from a mono-disciplinary point of view, having a transdisciplinary perspective is of utmost importance for sustainable and inclusive development (Di Giulio & Defila, 2017). It makes much more sense, as Galafassi et al. (2018) have found, to have “open and engaging transdisciplinary processes with large and diverse populations aimed at sharing experiences, co-creating knowledge and reimagining public goals” (p. 73). McGregor (2017) proposes nine possible transdisciplinary higher education pedagogies that have the potential to enable graduates to become more skilled at reflecting on data, concepts, and real-world items, as well as the activities of the problem-solving system/community and their modes of participation and inquiry. McGregor further suggests embedding the curriculum with the following teaching and learning approaches:

• 1. Double loop learning,

• 2. Deep education/learning,

• 3. Integrative curriculum,

• 4. Inquiry-based learning,

• 5. Value analysis,

• 6. Transformative learning,

• 7. Authentic curriculum,

• 8. Paradigm shifts,

• 9. Learning communities.

Considering that there are as many frameworks that have been developed for key competencies and Future Skills (Davies et al., 2011; Ehlers, 2020; OECD, 2018; UNESCO, 2018; World Economic Forum, 2020; Young & Chapman, 2010) as disciplines, there are obvious areas of commonality, overlaps, and variations of similar competencies that we would like our graduates to develop, and it would be impossible to come to a final, definite list. We contemplated transdisciplinary skills and competencies that would provide the students a strong basis to explore further, with better awareness and honing of their personal strengths, choices, and affinities. This made even more sense in the spirit of co-creation that we had adopted for developing this module while at the same time avoiding the one-size-fits-all approach.

With the above learning design approaches in mind, the module that was proposed in Mauritius to 1^st-year undergraduate students was designed to enhance or develop autonomy in choices of learning resources and educational technologies through four main blocks of learning which included the following transdisciplinary competencies:

• 1. Collaborative networking—Cultural awareness, Personal branding, Team playing, Networking and Trust building.

• 2. Communication—Emotional intelligence, Technology-enhanced communication, Verbal and non-verbal communication and Conflict management.

• 3. Growth mindsets—Solution-orientedness, Grit and perseverance, Opportunity-seeking, Design thinking, Critical and creative thinking.

• 4. Professional and ethical practices—Social responsibility, Sustainable competencies, Ethical dilemma management, Model Ethical situational leadership, Best practice application.

This module was actually designed and developed as an Open Educational Resource (OER) for the purpose of the Open Educational for a Better World (OE4BW) project and is available at: https://oe4bw.org/project/transdisciplinary-teaching-and-learning/.

The design of the Transdisciplinary Skills and Competencies project was inspired by the Delors Report which was prepared for UNESCO in 1996—“Learning: The treasure within”. The report provided an insight into the still relevant societal challenges of globalization, knowledge societies, inclusion, social cohesion, and democratic participation (Tawil & Cougoureux, 2013). The four pillars of learning (Learning to be, Learning to do, Learning to know, and Learning to live together) underpinned the development of learning activities for the module on Transdisciplinary Skills and Competencies (Table 14.1).

Table 14.1 Mapping the Delors Report (1996) to Future Graduate Skills

Because of COVID-19, our 1^st-year students were not able to get placements in industry which was a requirement of the BSc (Hons) Web and Multimedia development program. We thus proposed the module to the students so that they would be introduced to notions of work-place skills and competencies. The module would account for the required number of credits that the students would have otherwise lost and thus was a very timely opportunity to engage the students, and, eventually, get some university academics on board for feedback and enhancing the module, aiming to be as transdisciplinary as possible (Fig. 14.4).

Fig. 14.4

Main competencies to be developed during the Transdisciplinary Skills and Competencies Module for 1^st-year students

The various learning activities were presented to both academics and students from different departments at the university. Based on sound socio-constructivist pedagogical approaches, the learning activities comprised metacognitive processes, peer interactions, portfolios, and tangible outcomes of cooperative or sole projects (Felix, 2003, p. 159). The module rationale and learning outcomes as well as the assessment criteria used to appraise the student learning are presented in Table 14.2.

Table 14.2 Table of Learning activities for the Transdisciplinary Skills and Competencies Module

As can be observed, the list of competencies is non-exhaustive and interconnected, with obvious overlaps throughout the different learning activities. It is expected that the redundancies would only reinforce the different competencies required from these students, allow for a fail-fast method to develop resilience, and enable learners to value the opportunities for a second chance. The first-year students would need to document their individual learning paths and provide evidence of having achieved the various competencies through artefacts, videos or audio-recordings. If competencies were not reached, the students would need to indicate self-help resources (books, online videos, learning circles, and social networks, etc.) which would help them reach their personal levels of competencies. Both formative and summative assessments were carried out to enable the students to develop and nurture the different skills and competencies required. Since these were mostly qualitative, the learning and collaborative interactions were made “visible” through transcripts (of discussions for doing the activity) and reflections on competencies acquired.

5 Study Methodology

The present small-scale study sought to get feedback on a number of questions related to the concept of Future Skills. This was done through an online questionnaire (Annex 1a) sent to purposely sampled interviewees who had followed the Transdisciplinary Skills and Competencies module. The criteria used for determining the sample of students was to ensure a fair balance of gender-responses and that they were in different years of study (not only freshers or final year students).

The interview protocol (Annex 1b) sent to academics in both countries included open-ended questions. These were meant as an indication of the focus areas for the actual interview so that the academics could think and prepare prior to the focus group meetings.

A focus group discussion (FGD) was organized with 9 academics and 6 students to present the Transdisciplinary Skills and Competencies Module. Participation was purely voluntary, followed research ethics protocol, and the respondents gave their informed consent. The profiles of the academics can be viewed in Annex 2.

The 6 students who participated in the group discussion were mostly from the first year of Web and Multimedia development undergraduate program and had followed the module during the lock-down period. The majority of them were female and only one male student had responded positively to the call for participation.

Their views were recorded, transcribed, and analyzed using thematic analysis. Most of the lecturers (7) had over 20 years’ experience in higher education, while the remaining 2 academics had between 10- and 20-years’ experience. In our judgement, the length of experience is a good indicator of their opinion and experience with skills’ development in students and how best to undertake this in future.

6 Academics’ View of Future Skills

The main aim of the discussions was to gain consensus around the module outcomes and activities set and whether there should be any modifications or improvements that needed to be made.

From the focus group discussions with the academics, Future Skills is equivalent to new pedagogical developments (beyond online teaching and learning), indispensable skills in the future, skills leading to a sustainable society, skills required to respond, adapt, enhance learning to our ever-changing world, and skills which increase graduate employability. The academics noted the mismatch between what is done in universities and what is needed “on the ground”, in society. They highlighted the scarcity of IT and technological skills in particular.

Five out of nine respondents feel it is the university’s responsibility to develop graduates’ Future Skills. Nevertheless, they also thought some Future Skills needed to be acquired by the students in an autonomous manner. For the participating academics, the skills that students should develop individually are those related to communication (language, data manipulation, and visualization), entrepreneurship, and analysis.

The impact of the Covid-19 pandemic will be long-felt and thus better preparing the students to position themselves in the world of work is an important role of the higher education institutions (Kelly et al., 2022). Unsurprisingly, the academics focused their answers on the need for enhanced communication skills, as well as collaboration skills. Nevertheless, the same respondents indicated that lack of time, lack of appropriate training, lack of departmental/institutional support towards online tools and technology, as well as inability to identify Future Skills’ needs in the job market were all challenges educational systems face when trying to incorporate what they perceived as the more commonly referred-to twenty-first Century Skills (such as critical thinking, communication, social responsibility, creativity, etc.) in their daily teaching approaches. While these are important challenges shared by many countries world-wide, some factors related to the “smallness” or lack of critical mass of Mauritius and Eswatini can be mitigated through the use of case studies from other countries/regions and follow-up discussions when teaching learners about Future Skills.

Regarding the methodology or pedagogical approach to use when teaching Future Skills, the respondents were unanimous in preferring the integration of Future Skills in the existing curricula (modules). This could mean that irrelevant course content is struck off so that space and time is available to the embedding of Future Skills. In addition, Future Skills could be developed through the implementation of more work-based, project-based, experiential learning opportunities and through the use of oral student presentations and team-based work on case studies.

As a follow-up activity, a second cohort of Web and Multimedia students who are currently following the LLC 1080 module and who were assigned the Event Management learning activity were given the opportunity to voice out on which areas they would like to be assessed. The instructions were purposely left unstructured to allow for the students to make decisions pertaining to themes, duration, costs, roles, and responsibilities. The steps for the activity are as below:

Organizing a University-Wide Online Workshop on the Future of the University

• 1. Organize yourselves into 6 teams and, using any collaborative organizational tool of your choice (Slack, Google Docs, Discord, etc.), start brainstorming about: How to organize a university-wide workshop/conference/seminar on a collegially chosen Theme.

• 2. List the tasks and assign responsibilities to people in your team.

• 3. Define the themes and objectives of this online event along with who you would like to invite to (1) participate and (2) facilitate the event.

• 4. Make a list of possible speakers and prepare the promotional material required to disseminate the information to both your Workshop presenters and attendees.

• 5. Use Canva to create posters and share these with your networks.

• 6. Take minutes of your organizing committee meetings and have regular debriefing sessions which are also minuted after each task is completed.

• 7. Reflect on the organizational process—What were the challenges you faced? What were the most important decisions you had to take? How were conflicts managed, if any? What would be the next steps required to make this event happen? Post all your communication material on a shared drive and link this back to this module.

The assumptions for designing this activity were that Web and Multimedia students should be able to fit into as many disciplines as possible. Developing a professional mindset, they should be able to engage into sense-making discussions with their “clients”. In order to allow them to take ownership of the activity, they were allowed to define their own assessment criteria.

A word cloud was generated showing the main skills on which fifty (50) 1^st-year students would want to be assessed. They were given the opportunity to define areas where they felt they needed to get additional skills before getting onto the job market.

The word cloud shows that students are majorly concerned with attributes pertaining to professionalism and communication skills, which appeared 49 and 30 times respectively in the discussion forum that was set up for this learning activity. What is more interesting are the finer details at the periphery of the world cloud: concepts such as “Educated Judgement Calls” or “Sense of Self’ show that some students have a more sophisticated understanding of graduate attributes than others. We see this as a positive step towards self-determined areas of improvement, but at the same time observe the students’ lack of investigation into more contemporary needs of Future Skills; for example, green skills or sustainable development-related skills and competencies. Some of the verbatim comments from the students show that they had really put in a lot of effort and thinking into defining their own yardsticks for assessing their competencies. One student mentioned: “The most crucial life skill is the ability to communicate effectively. It is what allows us to communicate with others and comprehend what is communicated to us. To appreciate how basic the need to communicate is, just watch a newborn listening carefully to its mother and attempting to imitate the noises she makes.”

This highly emotional reference to communication and linking it to the affective relationship between mother and child shows the level of empathy that some students had engaged with for this activity. They deeply appreciated the ability to have a say in the assessment process: “Usually, as students we are assigned tasks or even assignments by lecturers. Grades are allocated in the light of how much we succeeded. However, having the opportunity to choose on which graduate attributes I want to be assessed on is a blessing.”

As they neared the end of the Module, the students could identify areas where they felt they had been able to perform the best and in which they would prefer to be assessed for the skills and competencies required. Assessments were based on well-defined rubrics linked to levels of skills demonstrated. For instance, for communication skills, we asked them to provide transcripts of their team organization using WhatsApp or Zoom. This enabled a transparent view of who was leading the discussion or who was free riding, who had more creative ideas, etc.). Students would then be assessed on their communication types: idea generator, supportive arguments, devil’s advocate (critical thinking).

7 Challenges and Further Research

As barriers to this study, we find that academics are quite hesitant to work with students as co-creators. This could possibly be owing to an already heavy workload, and the responsibility of supervising students on key projects will prove to be time-consuming. Also, some academics feel that because of lack of exposure, or possibly apathy to real world problems that reveals itself in the responses from the students, they would need to make an extra effort to on-board these students and convince them of the importance of this work-based learning opportunity. Additionally, an insular mentality prevents students from looking at bigger-picture world problems. More internationalization of the university (Kletz & Almog-Bareket, 2017) with more creative pedagogies, higher level of research in collaboration with industry, and engagement into international networks would help these graduates to have deeper learning opportunities. Already by reaching out to different faculties, the students have been able to experience the importance of creating personal networks and becoming more visible, and therefore present their capabilities to the academic and student community. Future research in this area will need to include other students and academics from different faculties, so that the interaction between the students can lead to identifying common areas of interest which might in turn lead to synergies for developing sustainable solutions to these.

7.1 Learnings and Recommendations

Whilst we have not yet worked with students in Eswatini, the feedback and learning experiences from the first two batches at the University of Mauritius (one cohort is ongoing) has supported reflection on practice (Schön, 1987) and provided the opportunity for continuously improving on this mutual learning experience. Some suggestions for improvement were made by the students as follows:

• 1. Assign a problem/project that highlights the content you want students to learn in your program (It can be related to the program course).

• 2. Feature a guest speaker in the field of study to celebrate a “day in the life of”. (The guest can be an ex-student of the same course or those who have been on internship).

• 3. Encourage students to work alone and in groups, knowing that they need to communicate, share ideas, and participate in class discussions. (Choosing groups for teamwork would help students feel comfortable with people other than their friends).

• 4. Nominate an “employee of the week/student of the week” each week based on the best assignments. (To motivate and to encourage participation in the program).

• 5. Include embedded videos with local cases of workplace conflicts and learning experiences that could be discussed by students who had gone for short work placements.

• 6. Ensure that students create healthy working relationships and that toxic events are openly discussed so that consensus for mutual benefits can be agreed upon.

• 7. Make students realize that their behavior will impact on future cohorts through story-telling activities from previous cohorts sharing their experiences.

While some students felt that they could do with more instructions and guidance, in general students found that the module had helped them build confidence and that they had discovered sides of their personality that they had not thought of:

“There were some concepts which were a bit difficult. For example, I had difficulties understanding the future wheel but I also got some feedback from my friends who said the content was not related to web multimedia. I think that they did not understand the concept of the module, it was more about preparing us for the world of work. For me, it was okay.”

“I’m much more confident because once we looked up T-graduates and that really helped me get into the mind of an employer and what he’s looking for, that really helped me. And then with the Viva Sessions, we were given some prompts as to what we have to talk about.”

“I think after the Ikigai one, it really got me thinking and re-evaluating all of my dreams because there are some aspects that we miss that we forget, like how it will contribute to the world and everything. And when you put all that together, that’s when you realise that we did not think about it thoroughly. So we really need a reality check, maybe a one to one session to make us realise sometimes we don’t even realise what we need and what we lack until we get the opportunity to. So that would be good.”

Eventually, the co-creation of a module on Future Skills and competencies is one that students are very keen to participate in and would provide academics with greater variety of learning experiences and cases for their students to learn from. Of course, this requires some organization to bring the academics and students together to work towards breaking down existing silos. Also, it would be important to include more learning activities related to sustainable development, frugal innovation, and green skills. Having a consortium or special interest group approach could provide the necessary structure and is worth investigating further.

8 Conclusion

This chapter started off with a general look at Future Skills and transdisciplinary approaches to teaching and learning. A two-fold method—a questionnaire sent to academics in two Southern African Small States (Mauritius and Eswatini) followed by interviews and discussions with Mauritian 1^st-year university students having taken a module on Transdisciplinary Skills and Competencies allowed us to identify some of the Future Skills both Small States perceive as most important, and also to list some of the possible teaching and learning approaches to incubate these.

The current education system in Mauritius and Eswatini, like in many developing countries, is based on traditional teacher-centered approaches where students are not provided with adequate opportunities to develop transdisciplinary skills and competencies. The discussions from both the students and academics suggest that self-efficacy and self-directed learning are not being promoted sufficiently. Students expect that their lecturers will determine “the knowledge that needs to be transferred, design and conduct training and monitor and evaluate the outcomes” (Santos Rocha & van Berg, 2017). For self-directed learning (Knowles, 1975), learners should take control—make decisions, and take responsibility for their learning process. Clearly, the first-year students were still requiring the scaffolding that they were used to, and as this module was asking them to co-construct their own knowledge and various competencies not only individually, but also collaboratively with more knowledgeable others (Vygotsky, 1978), it was important to enhance the module to clearly enunciate the more self-reliant competence that was required from the students.

This chapter has its obvious limits. It is exploratory in nature, and thus the results are inconclusive; owing to the small sample population. However, we attempted to provide authentic information based on teaching and learning experiences. The chapter gives a clear indication of the Future Skills’ gaps, how these might be filled and what additional research would assist the communities of both Small States to build resilience, in particular after two years of the Covid-19 pandemic.

Future Skills in Practice: Our Recommendations

• Upgrade the education system from teacher-centered to more learner-centered approaches; providing students with more ownership, empowerment, and discernment for their learning capabilities to transform these into core competencies.

• Enhance co-creation across disciplines for more authentic skill building.

• Build upon existing frameworks for Education with strong moral compasses—For instance the Delors report which emphasizes the four pillars of learning (Learning to know, Learning to do, Learning to live together, and Learning to be) and taking into consideration the challenges and opportunities of globalization, knowledge societies, inclusion, social cohesion, and democratic participation.

• Humbly accept that for sustainable development, we need to be more frugal in our approach to innovation, and that Small States are a great lesson to the world in terms of providing its people with skills for Resourcefulness, Resilience, Relationships and Reliability for Sustainable Development.

Appendices

Annex 1a) Interview Protocol for Students

The survey questions asked to students were as follows:

• 1. For you, what does the concept of Future Skills refer to?

• 2. In which of the courses you took did you encounter references to Future Skills?

• 3. Was this your first time to learn about some of these skills?

• 4. Which [future] skills do you value the most for your own personal development?

• 5. Which [future] skills do you value the most for your own professional development?

• 6. What did your work placement/internship teach you about Future Skills?

• 7. What competencies have you developed during the work placement and would recommend to your juniors?

• 8. What competencies and skills have you realised were important from the LLC1080 Module?

• 9. How prepared are you to develop these skills after work placement?

• 10. Which Future Skills did you expect to gain from your studies?

• 11. Which Future Skills did you expect to gain from your work placement/internship?

• 12. Which Future Skills did you expect to have to develop individually/autonomously?

• 13. In which of the courses you took did you encounter references to Future Skills?

• 14. Was this your first time to learn about some of these skills?

Annex 1b) Interview Protocol for Academics

• 1. For you, what does the concept of Future Skills refer to?

• 2. Which Future Skills did you expect your students to have to develop individually/autonomously?

• 3. What is specific to Mauritius/Eswatini in terms of skills development? Have we got the right mix of talents/workforce?

• 4. How do we mitigate the effects of smallness and “lack of critical mass?”

• 5. To what extent is it the responsibility of the university to develop graduates’ Future Skills?

• 6. How do you embed these skills without overloading the existing curriculum?

• 7. Your Existing Module/Course Catalogue Structure—Can it be improved to embed Future Skills within the assessments?

• 8. Can you please provide three or more practical recommendations for others when implementing Future Skills into higher education?

Annex 2

The academics had the following profiles:

• Faculty of Social Sciences and Humanities: F—Lecturer in Psychology—8 years’ experience

• Faculty of Law and Management: M—Senior Lecturer in HRM—25 years’ experience

• Faculty of Agriculture: M—Associate Professor Biometry—28 years’ experience

• Faculty of Agriculture: M—Senior Lecturer in Agricultural Sciences—26 years’ experience

• Faculty of Engineering: F—Senior Lecturer in Town and Country Planning—20 years’ Experience

• Faculty of Medicine and Health Sciences: F—Associate Professor in Medicine—26 years’ experience

• Faculty of Information Communication and Digital Technologies: F—Senior Lecturer Software and Information Systems—15 years’ experience

• Faculty of Science: M—Associate Professor in Mathematical Modelling—20 years’ Experience

• Centre for Innovative and Lifelong Learning: F—Senior Lecturer Graphic Design—22 years’ experience