For Vincent Meelberg, the results of the National Student Survey 2023 hardly came as a surprise. The survey revealed something he believes to have been true for some time: many students do not know how to apply their newly acquired academic knowledge in their future fields of work. “The essence of their criticism is that they learn a lot at academic level, but don't actually know what to do with that knowledge if they don't wish to become scholars,” he explains. A signal that got Meelberg and his fellow academic lecturers thinking. “We wanted to meet students halfway without becoming too much like a university of applied sciences. The academic character must of course be preserved in our teaching, but it can be supplemented with a link to professional practice.”
How we can bridge the gap between university education and professional practice
Is it possible to connect academic higher education to professional practice without sacrificing its academic character? Vincent Meelberg thinks so. The Assistant Professor of the Radboud University Department of Cultural Studies is working on an educational innovation project that aims to do just that. The goal of the project? “To teach students to also apply academic depth outside the university.”
New way of testing
It soon became clear to Meelberg and his colleagues how they could make the link to professional practice in university education: with practice-based assignments. Meelberg: “We still tend to assess students by asking them to write essays in which they reflect on topics from an academic perspective. We want to change this way of testing for a number of courses, by having students complete practice-based assignments instead of writing essays, with a subsequent reflection report. That way they are both doing practical work and applying their new academic knowledge and skills in their reflection report.”
The practice-based assignments focus on an aspect that almost all students will eventually face in their work: communication. “With these assignments, we want to teach students to convey academic knowledge to a wide audience in an understandable way,” Meelberg explains.
“This kind of multimedia approach is increasingly used in all fields: combining journalistic interview techniques, podcasts and videos. We are currently working on digital instruction modules that will teach both lecturers and students how to use these communication tools. The modules are not only about how to technically create a podcast or video, for example, but also how to convey a message while maintaining academic value. This is important because it helps students learn how to also apply academic depth outside the university."
Implications for lecturers
Meelberg expects the digital instructional modules to become available at Radboud University by the end of this academic year. Developing these modules is part of his project ‘A bridge between education and professional practice with practice-based assignments’, which is funded by a TLC voucher from the Radboud Teaching and Learning Centre. Initially, Meelberg expects the digital instruction modules to mostly be of interest to students and lecturers from the Cultural Studies, Art History, Sociology, and Anthropology study programmes. He stresses that in the preparatory phase, the main focus is on lecturers. “They are generally enthusiastic, but many also say that they would like to first learn how to make a podcast or video themselves so that they know how it works before they assign it to students. We hope to increase the lecturers' knowledge and skills in this respect in the coming months.”
Meelberg emphasises that the decision to use practice-based assignments was not only driven by students' wishes, but also by the fast-changing world. “That changing world means assistant professors are looking for new ways of assessing students, not just based on written language with exams and essays. Plus, practice-based assignments are better suited to the learning needs of students with less strong language skills. So an added advantage is that we are making our university more inclusive.”
Want to know more about this project? Have a look at 'A bridge between education and professional practice with practice-based assignments'.
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