Embarking on a Journey of Discovery: Developing Transitional Skill Sets through a Scholarly Concentration Program

Research experiences in various forms have been available to medical students for many decades. However, recently, there has been a trend to integrate this opportunity into existing curriculum through scholarly concentration programs. The impetus for including research during medical school is to acquire and develop critical thinking and analytical skills prior to residency without adding time to undergraduate medical education. Research program structure, feedback, and survey outcomes from the newly formed Oakland University William Beaumont School of Medicine (OUWB) are presented. Conclusions drawn support the potential for rigorous future research endeavors as the students move into their graduate medical education.

The present article analyzes the development of personal and professional skills of managers who perform managing function in contemporary organizations. Research shows that it is necessary to develop managers‘ skills using a set of different methods and tools. In the course of time, a number of models for manager skills development that recommend the potential ways for the implementation of these processes have been created. One of these models is the training cycle proposed by Kolb (1992) encompassing four stages: actions, thinking, understanding, and checking. Another model – the one made by Byham, Smith, and Pease (2002) - is based on application of group training method. It is carried out in five stages: 1) formation of a group of employees, 2) defining training abilities of the employees, 3) making recommendations for the development, 4) implementing the program, 5) defining directions for new improvements. Probably, the most widely applied and used model is Statt‘s(2000) sequence of development processes: defining demand for development, formulating the goals, compiling the content, choosing the methods, evaluating the results. The most modern model is Whetten and Cameron‘s (2002) five-step model applying social science theory. It is based on the following steps: assessment of a skill, development of the skill, analysis of the skill, testing the skill in practice, using the skill in practical performance. The above listed models have their strengths and weaknesses. The most typical weakness is underestimated complexity and sophisticated character of the development process. Having made the analysis of the described models of managers‘ personal and professional skills development and having generalized the results of particular research carried out in Lithuanian organizations, it could be stated that the process of skills development needs to be improved. This process holistically combining possible 17 activities. On a basis of research results, the article offers a holistic development process that is comprised of the following fields: defining personal and professional priority skills of managers; selecting of employees and assessing of their possessed skills; choosing the best tool for the assessment; systematization of the skills to be developed; search for the possible development ways and methods; choosing the development method that corresponds the goals; providing managing activity to the trained employees; correcting the development process depending on specific situations; responding to the needs of the development; combining several development tools; applying of short-term development tools; choosing the most suitable development program; defining the role of direct supervisor in the development process; appointing mentors for the employees involved in self-development; career planning. Implementation of the holistic model of managers‘ skills development process showed that this attitude has positive impact on the results of this process. In order to survive in constantly changing society, people must learn a lot on their own; most often it is related to competence training seminars, re-qualification training, maintenance of professional competence level, development of personal and professional skills.

The subject of the article is the study of competitiveness significance of a future specialist, consideration of the main aspects of competitiveness and effective ways of its formation. The aim of the study is the increase of efficiency competitiveness formation in a future specialist in the high school educational environment. The changing modern conditions demand not only flexibility, mobility, high culture from the specialist, but also his readiness for self-development, self-education, introspection and creative self-realization. It is competitiveness that includes all these qualities and it is one of the important factors at the job market. Recommendations: it is necessary to create certain pedagogical conditions to form competitiveness in a future specialist effectively. These conditions are the following: organization of competitive educational environment at high school; enrichment of educational content with training aids contributing to personal professional development; priority of problem-searching and creative tasks; teaching future specialists methods of research, socially important and designed activity; formation of readiness for competitive relations; development of professional competences, practical skills and abilities, knowledge of demands to specialists at modern market. Conclusion: it is advisable to introduce special elective courses, seminars and trainings into the curriculum of high school to educate competitive specialists. This will increase the value of such specialists at the job market.

Many medical curricula now include programs that provide students with opportunities for scholarship beyond that provided by their traditional, core curricula. These scholarly concentration (SC) programs vary greatly in focus and structure, but they share the goal of producing physicians with improved analytic, creative, and critical-thinking skills. In this article, the authors explore models of both required and elective SC programs. They gathered information through a review of medical school Web sites and direct contact with representatives of individual programs. Additionally, they discuss in-depth the SC programs of the Warren Alpert Medical School of Brown University; the University of South Florida College of Medicine; the University of California, San Francisco; and Stanford University School of Medicine. The authors describe each program's focus, participation, duration, centralization, capstone requirement, faculty involvement, and areas of concentration. Established to address a variety of challenges in the U.S. medical education system, these four programs provide an array of possible models for schools that are considering the establishment of an SC program. Although data on the impact of SC programs are lacking, the authors believe that this type of program has the potential to significantly impact the education of medical students through scholarly, in-depth inquiry and longitudinal faculty mentorship.

The Comparative Study and Development of Teaching Competency Standards in Higher Education Level Between Faculty Members and Senior Students Among 6 ASEAN Universities Under MOU.

The research focused on how the application of the project method in the educational process contributes to a deeper understanding of theoretical knowledge and the development of practical skills among students of technical specialities. In this study, an analysis of the effectiveness of design technologies in teaching the construction and maintenance of cars was carried out, which allowed assessing their impact on the development of theoretical and practical skills of students. It was found that the use of project technologies in teaching significantly improves the quality of students’ assimilation of theoretical knowledge and contributes to the development of practical skills. It was found that students who completed tasks in the form of projects better understood the principles of operation of automotive systems and were able to apply their knowledge in real situations. Practical work in the project format contributed to the development of critical thinking and the ability to make informed decisions, as participants were forced to analyse problems and find optimal ways to solve them. It was also found that the project method increased students' motivation to learn and encouraged them to independently search for information, collaborate in a team, and use modern diagnostic tools. Work in groups contributed to the development of communication and time management skills, which are important in professional activities. In general, the results of the study indicate a significant increase in the effectiveness of the educational process through the integration of the project method, which contributes not only to a deeper assimilation of theoretical knowledge, but also to the development of practical skills that directly affect the professional readiness of students of technical specialities. The results of this study can be used in educational institutions that train car maintenance specialists to improve training programmes and teaching methods

Increased global trade coupled with diversified employment opportunities demand college graduates possessing well-developed professional skills. Recent survey results identified the importance of professional skills among candidates seeking employment, with communication being recognized as the most important skill or quality when selecting candidates. The ability to work within a team structure, solve complex problems, and organize and prioritize work also ranked high among industry employment needs. Despite a rigorous focus on discipline-oriented knowledge and skills, development of professional skills in students of horticulture may be overlooked or not fully developed. Teaching methods can be modified to incorporate development of professional skills and discipline-oriented knowledge to enhance student employment preparedness and directly address industry needs.

This study examined the effect of cultural immersion experiences during study abroad programs on students’ professional career development skills. A survey was conducted among 78 participants from a Texan university, exploring the relationship between various aspects of cultural immersion and career skill development. Results show that confidence in career pre-immersion and incorporating cultural experiences into professional networking positively affect skill acquisition. However, the number of immersion experiences and belief in their career impact from their experience did not significantly predict outcomes. These findings highlight the value of cultural immersion in enhancing students’ global competency and career readiness in college students.

Improving employees’ development of professional skills is progressively an important function of an innovative culture. However, the empirical evidence for the role of innovative culture in engendering the development of professional skills is scarce. To address this issue, we employ schema theory and link positive and negative intrinsic motivators in an integrated model. In addition to identifying the influences of innovative culture on the development of professional skills, this study particularly focuses on the mediating effects of supportive leadership and the moderating effects of individual power distance orientation, which have fundamentally been neglected in previous literature. The results support an integrative perspective in which innovative culture works through supportive leadership, which in turn interacts with power distance orientation and enhances development of professional skills of information technology (IT) 317 professional technical engineers. This relationship was more positive when power distance orientation was determined to be lower, rather than higher.

"Social networks have become an important source of information, especially professional networks, where users share information about their academic and professional qualifications, skills and work experience. Nowadays, where the updating and development of professional skills is becoming more and more relevant for professionals, this information is of great interest, since it allows to know the trend of the labor market. In this regard, LinkedIn, in particular, has become one of the most widely used professional networks for this purpose, designed for professional networking and job search. From the professional profiles shared in this media, it is possible to retrieve relevant information for the labor sector, to know information about the professional profiles according to their competencies, as well as the most demanded competencies in the different job positions. This makes it possible to detect formation needs to improve or develop new skills. Additionally, LinkedIn has a particular element, the endorsements, through which it allows members of the network to acknowledge the skills of other members, which could provide information related to the level of development of a given skill. The analysis of this information, in addition to detecting training needs, can be used to adapt curricula to meet these needs, as well as in the field of human resources, to find the right candidates for the job. Currently, recommender systems have become a powerful tool for suggesting relevant articles to users. In the field of education, they have become very powerful, making it possible to link the training offer with the training needs of users, especially in the field of continuing education, in order to meet the need to develop professional skills. In a previous work, we have developed a recommendation system based on machine learning and ontology to recommend continuing education courses to LinkedIn users. As an extension of our work, we propose to incorporate the endorsement information to the user profiles to determine the improvement in the recommendations of our recommendation system. The results obtained showed an improvement in the recommendations, obtaining an accuracy of 94%."

Development of professional competencies in the field of social pharmacy represents a key prerequisite for sustainable changes in pharmaceutical education and practice. National Competency Framework for Pharmacists of Serbia (NCFPS) [1] provides structured model that enables integration of theoretical knowledge with practical skills development, highlighting self-assessment and self-refllection as essential meta-competencies. Objective was to familiarize pharmacy students with NCFPS and methodology of competence assessment and self-assessment, as well as to examine the effects of an educational intervention on development of professional skills in field of social pharmacy. Study was conducted within the course Professional Development and Career Planning. Students performed an initial self-assessment of competencies based on 24 statements related to social pharmacy, participated in educational intervention, and subsequently repeated self-assessment. Results were analyzed by comparing the initial and final assessments. In the first round of self-assessment, students rated their competencies highest (score 4) in communication skills (62.90%), establishing positive team relationships (37.10%), and use of information and communication technologies (33.87%), while only 6.45% rated themselves highest in public health initiatives and knowledge of legal regulations. Following educational intervention, an increase in scores was recorded across all domains, with the most significant improvement observed in health promotion, healthy lifestyle, and disease prevention and control, where proportion of the highest scores rose from 8.06% to 46.77%. Application of NCFPS in teaching process confirms its value as tool for linking theoretical foundations of social pharmacy with practical competencies. Integration of self-assessment and introspective learning into curriculum contributes to formation of professional identity and strengthens competencies of strategic importance for sustainable development of pharmacy profession.

The integration of Entrustable Professional Activities (EPAs) using the Integrated Curriculum Design Framework (ICDF) is a promising yet underexplored strategy in pharmacy education. This reflective work identifies gaps in traditional approaches to competency-based education and highlights the alignment of the "Professional Practice Skills" Year 2 module at a UK university with EPAs and ICDF. By bridging these gaps, this work highlights the importance of equipping students with the competencies necessary for independent practice. The "Professional Practice Skills" module was transformed to align with ICDF and EPAs. Stakeholder engagement, including input from students, educators, and practitioners, guided the selection of EPAs reflective of real-world pharmacy tasks such as patient counselling, prescribing, prescriber interaction, and providing medicine query information. Learning outcomes were redefined to incorporate these EPAs, and teaching strategies were adapted to include experiential learning activities, such as simulated patient scenarios and reflective tasks. Assessment methods shifted from knowledge-based to competency-based evaluations, ensuring students could demonstrate practical readiness for professional roles. Integrating EPAs and ICDF revealed challenges, such as resistance to change and the need for significant resource investment in designing simulations. However, the shift encouraged collaborative teaching practices and enhanced student engagement. Students demonstrated improved confidence and ability to apply theoretical knowledge in practice, showcasing the value of a competency-based approach. This integration process highlights the importance of aligning curriculum design with professional competencies. The work has broader implications for pharmacy education, offering a replicable model for other healthcare institutions seeking to enhance professional readiness.

In English for Specific Purposes, one of the challenges is to transform teaching and learning into a process, which focuses on the development of professional skills, enables students to become successful learners of the target language, and makes them more aware of the local and global environments. This paper aims to analyse key challenges that teachers and learners face in the classrooms and suggest a way of integrating global issues into the process of development of professional soft and hard skills. The paper studies the existing ESP literature in terms of presence of global issues, explores the perceptions of global issues among university students in Ukraine, outlines the correlation between professional skills and global competence. The findings suggest that there are numerous advantages of introducing materials based on global issues into the teaching process as it has synergetic effect of fusing professional skills, soft skills and global competence. The paper concludes that this fusion improves the skill set of a future professional and has a positive impact on the quality of higher education in general.

Développer des interventions de prévention et de promotion de la santé fondées sur les données probantes : la Démarche EValuation Action (DEVA)

The role of internships in building professional skills of physical education students in training has led to many reflections. The data from this study, which are part of the field of professional didactics, reflect the development of professionalism of student trainees. The descriptive and interpretive study included 74 physical education trainee students engaged in field placements. The data collection used a professional skills assessment grid and interviews to capture the meaning they attribute to their personal and subjective experience during the internships. The results obtained show that internships have repercussions on the professional skills acquired by trainee students, in relation to the level of communication between trainee and student teachers, the design of teaching situations, the assessment of the progress of learning and learning, and the degree of skill acquisition. In conclusion, the results of this work call for the improvement of conditions for monitoring and developing the experience of trainee students in terms of didactic, psychopedagogical and environmental knowledge.