Interesting results so far…

The survey’s off and running!! I peeked at the current results this morning and found something that I didn’t expect. Three skill sets immediately appeared at the top end of the most important scale, but none of the four really pulled ahead as a clear leader.

The other side of the scale tells a dramatically different tale. On the least important skills end, two entries immediately (and boldly) jumped to the last two positions in the race. Over half of the respondents ranked one skill set in the last position.

Which skill set landed on the bottom? I’ll give you a hint… It’s probably not the one that you think.

Tune in next week for preliminary results. In the meantime, convince your contacts and colleagues to take the survey. The more, the merrier (and the more valuable)!

Got a minute to share?

Let’s start by asking what the customers want. (It’s a weird and dangerous notion, I realize, but I believe there’s promise to it.)

If we’re going to crack open the system and start messing with its innards, then we should start with what’s broken and what still works. I distilled this into a 60 second (really!) survey to identify the “make or break” real world skill sets for college kids.

Please take the survey and share your insights! (And share the survey link with others who hire, teach, coach, inspire, and affect college students. I want to hear thoughts from all over.

I’ll post the results here periodically so we can learn from each other.

Talk to me. Tell me something.

There’s a very interesting letter about what hiring managers want from new college graduates in this issue of the Tech Collegian from the Institute of Technology at West Virginia University (look on Page 6, “An Employer Speaks”).

HR Manager Helen Bidol points out an important corporate organizational trend that university programs overlook:

More and more, companies are structuring themselves with fewer layers of hierarchy,
moving toward a horizontal or “flat” organizational structure. To be successful, students must be able to communicate laterally—with co-worker peers on the same level—as well as vertically with those above or below.

She makes some great points about how team projects in college can actually hinder students in that environment — talk about unanticipated outcomes!

Doing cannonballs in the university pool

There’s gotta be a better way to prepare college students for life. It’s out there somewhere, and we’re going to find it.

This blog focuses on the process of crafting working adults from raw college students. It examines (and likely skewers, roasts, and barbeques) the sacred educational cows that many profs strive to protect. It asks a lot of questions, aims to create some good discussion, and aspires to changing the world, one student at a time.

If you hire, teach, train, repair, coach, supervise, love, or care about college students, there’s a place for you here. Let’s go change the world, shall we?