TECHNOLOGY SKILLS OF INCOMING FRESHMAN: ARE FIRST-YEAR STUDENTS PREPARED?* PANEL PRESENTATION Jeffrey A. Stone (Moderator) Pennsylvania State University, PA
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Mark E. Hoffman Quinnipiac University, CT
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Elinor M. Madigan Pennsylvania State University, PA
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David R. Vance Quinnipiac University, CT
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INTRODUCTION The use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) is pervasive throughout the university curriculum. First-year students who arrive deficient in these skills are ill-prepared to succeed in today’s academic environment. Given that the modern workplace requires ICT-literate knowledge workers, it is imperative that students attain the skills required to succeed Our panel will examine this issue on four fronts. First we will examine how insufficient state curriculum standards may hinder the ability of first-year students to succeed. Next we will examine the experience and skill differences which exist among first-year students. We will then examine how the contrast between faculty expectations and actual student skills. Finally, we will examine how first-year students learn their technology skills. JEFFREY A. STONE The primary responsibility of K-12 schools is to instill in students the necessary skills to function in society. States have traditionally defined these skills through the core ___________________________________________ *
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JCSC 21, 6 (June 2006) areas of Math, English, and Science. The increasingly electronic workplace mandates that states redefine their definition of “necessary skills” to include ICT literacy. Unfortunately, current state educational standards for ICT skills are often vague, insufficient, and inconsistent. Some states (e.g. California) do not have specific technology standards, choosing instead to integrate technology into the traditional curriculum guidelines. Some states (e.g. Ohio) have ambitious standards for ICT education. The disparity in these standards, especially on implementation method and the definition of “ICT literacy”, translate into a varied set of student outcomes. While it is unclear whether the mere presence of standards translates into higher ICT literacy, prior research suggests that students are not leaving high school with the knowledge necessary to function in either academia or the workplace [2]. Many state standards have limited or nonexistent guidelines for the ICT skills thought necessary to succeed at the university level (e.g. Internet research, electronic communication, and basic computing skills). Incoming freshmen are increasingly expected to have a grasp of these basic skills before they ever set foot in a college classroom. Today even the basic academic and administrative student tasks are being done electronically. Gone are the days when a student would wait in line to sign up for classes, use a typewriter to write an English paper, or flip through a stack of cards to find a library book. A lack of basic ICT skills may render an incoming freshman unable to perform the fundamental tasks required at the university level. Just as “remedial” Math and English courses are common in many colleges, there soon may be a need for “remedial” classes in basic ICT skills. This prospect poses challenges in resources, scheduling, and student recruitment. Without defined, achievable, and consistent standards, K-12 schools may produce students who are both unprepared for college and unprepared to become the knowledge workers of tomorrow. MARK E. HOFFMAN The technology session during our June new student orientation typically took the full time allotment; however, over the past two years sessions ended early. We might attribute this to our students greater access to technology. On surveys administered during the 2004 and 2005 June orientations, students reported an increase from 70% to 85% in home broadband Internet access. When asked how long they have used a computer, over 90% reported “over 5 years.” The question we need to consider is: How does long-term computer use and broadband Internet access affect what first-year students know about ICT? The results of our 2004 survey indicate that students who learn technology tasks “in the home” with significant family support are “native users” in the same sense that native speakers learn their native language at home with family support [3]. The implication is that native users know enough to accomplish their objectives, but that may not be sufficient to be successful in college. A recent basic computer skills assessment of first-year students showed that students are proficient with many Microsoft Word features [4]. What self-reporting and skills assessments do not tell us is how effectively students
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CCSC:Northeastern Conference can use word processing. Where most native English speakers take Freshman English to learn to effectively use their native language, native users may require similar education. Gender differences have been a continuing problem where females have consistently reported lower skill levels. Tentative survey results indicate this might be changing. Between 2004 and 2005, females reported increased skill levels on effectively all tasks while males remained constant. Female access to broadband Internet connections at home increased over 10% compared to 4.6% for males. It could be that females are acquiring broadband connections to communicate. Finding ICT less intimidating, females may report skill levels similar to males that have been traditionally higher. The implications for IS/CS faculty are that traditional, applications-based computer literacy courses must change, and ICT may be loosing its “geek” mystique. Could this be a factor along side outsourcing and perceived low job prospects contributing to the drop in interest in IS/CS careers? ELINOR M. MADIGAN Undergraduate general education courses for first year students are designed to lead them towards competency in quantification, communication and critical thinking. The use of technology is prevalent throughout these courses, as students are expected to be able to word process, work with spreadsheets, create presentations, send email, navigate the Internet and generally be technically adept. Faculty anticipate first-year students will arrive with technology abilities and be information literate, with the ability to create search strategies and evaluate their results [1]. At our university we are in the midst of a three-year study on the technology skills of incoming students. We used current literature to identify 20 technology skills, from four domains, on which the students rated themselves on a 1-5 scale (1 = “no knowledge” and 5 = “expert knowledge”). The four domains were defined as basic computer skills, application skills, Internet skills, and research skills. Our current results show that students rank themselves at the intermediate to expert level in the computer, application, and Internet domains and at the good to intermediate level in the research domain. The domains allowed students to rate themselves on such things as using a word processor, installing software, performing Web searches, and using e-mail. We also administered a similar survey to the faculty asking them to indicate the skill level that they expect students to have upon arrival, using the skills from the original four skill domains. Faculty expect students to arrive with intermediate to expert skill levels in the application and Internet domains, be at the good to intermediate level in the computer domain, and only be beginners in the research domain. Clearly faculty expect incoming first year students to be technologically fluent but not necessarily information literate. This finding leads us to question whether incoming first-year students are actually technologically fluent and information literate as they believe and faculty expect. A pilot study with our first year seminar students showed that students actually performed at a level far below both their perceptions and faculty expectations. Our results show that incoming first year students are neither technologically fluent nor information literate. Efforts need to be made in technology, much like those for Math
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JCSC 21, 6 (June 2006) and English, to identify the skills students should possess to be prepared for university-level work DAVID R. VANCE Most students arriving at university this fall are “digital natives” in the sense that they have grown up with computers, software applications, internet access, and related communication tools. Recent surveys show that word processing, for instance, is native to these students in the sense that most of them report having learned it at home with family support [3]. Growing up with an application, however, does not mean having an advanced skill set, no more than growing up with the English language means having advanced compositional skills. My experience training students leads me to conclude that their native familiarity provides not any given set of skills, even in applications that students claim to know, but rather a basic orientation and familiarity. Students I’ve observed are comfortable with computing environments, with application commands and behavior, the use of menu systems, navigation techniques, input devices, and they take new applications and features in stride. This in turn affects the way they train; where non-natives train to application features and are frequently limited in their understanding by the physical metaphors of user interfaces, natives are more concerned with how to navigate the application. This approach is rational in the absence of specific needed uses, given the richness of many applications and the variety of uses many applications serve. If this native approach to application learning extrapolates to internet and computer use generally, then our students arrive on campus with a potential for meta-skill, the skill of acquiring skills, more important and more difficult to measure than any specific skill set. It also suggests that their initial specific skills are nearly as various as their use of native language, and likely just as uncritical and unconscious. With rare exception, the primary concern of digital natives is to use technology, not to understand its structure or principles. Much of the computing technology that made exotic machines appear on university desktops just a few years ago and that motivated special efforts to inculcate a new sort of literacy is now commonplace and part of the shared social background. Computer Science is an increasingly specialized part of education, and the general need for computer literacy has been replaced with a more urgent need for information literacy. But that kind of literacy has always been, and remains, part of the traditional mission of liberal education, even as the sources and means of information expand. Our students have changed, but their need for education has not. They still need to become more reflective, critical users of their native language and of the power and possibilities of their familiar technologies. BIOGRAPHIES Jeffrey A. Stone is an Instructor of Information Sciences and Technology (IST) at the Pennsylvania State University. His research interests lie in the areas of pedagogy, network security, and technology standards. 120
CCSC:Northeastern Conference Mark Hoffman is an Associate Professor of Computer Science at Quinnipiac University. Dr. Hoffman earned his Ph.D. from Polytechnic University in Brooklyn, NY in 2001. His research interests include system-level CS education, computer literacy, the impact of the Internet on society, and content-based image retrieval using shape. Elinor Madigan is an Assistant Professor of Information Sciences and Technology (IST) at the Pennsylvania State University. She provides consulting and training workshops to the business community in Project Management and the uses of various computer tools as well as statistical consultation with a specialty in the analysis and design of surveys. Her areas of instruction include database theory and design, telecommunications and mathematics and project management. David R. Vance is the Manager of Training and Communications for Information Services at Quinnipiac University in Hamden, CT. He also teaches ethics in QU’s College of Professional Studies and philosophy in the undergraduate curriculum. Mr. Vance’s areas of research concern have been primarily in social and political ethics REFERENCES [1] DeMars, C.E., Cameron, L. and Erwin, T.D., “Information Literacy as Foundational: Determining Competence,” The Journal of General Education, (52, 4) pp. 253-265, 2003. [2] Halperin, S., ed. The Forgotten Half Revisited. Washington, DC: American Youth Policy Forum, (1998) (ED 425 275). [3] Hoffman, M.E. and D.R. Vance, “Computer Literacy: What Students Know and From Whom They Learned It,” SIGCSE’05, February 23–27, 2005, St. Louis, Missouri. [4] Tesch, D., M. Murphy, and E. Crable, “Implementation of a Basic Computer Skills Assessment Mechanism for Incoming Freshmen,” Proc ISECON 2004, (21) pp 1-9, Nov. 2004.
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