The response of the "non-vocational" disciplines towards increasing focus on employability in their curricula : a case study of the Faculty of humanitites at the University of Oslo
This thesis examines the influence of increasing focus on employability in higher education on the response of the Universities and traditionally oriented programmes and faculties, humanities in particular. The research is carried out in the form of a case study, and has taken place at the Faculty of humanities at the University of Oslo. The attempts of the Faculty to contribute to students’ employability are revised and analyzed. Summarizing the reasons for increasing focus on employability in higher education, this particular case study accentuates employability as a response to practical application of knowledge and orientation on successful learning outcomes accentuated in HEIs to “prepare” students for the increasingly complicated challenges in society. Since there is no universally accepted strategy for introducing employability focus in higher education, this approach is argued to depend a lot on the combined initiatives of the Faculty and the academics and on the appropriately structured curriculum able to develop knowledgeable and highly-skilled graduates. Accordingly, changes in the curriculum are analyzed in relation to three domains of “knowledge, action and self” introduced by Barnett et al. (2001) and encountered constraints are examined. The differences between traditional and interdisciplinary programmes are analyzed in the context of programmes’ abilities towards implementing employability focus in their curricula. The challenges “non-vocational” disciplines encounter when increasing focus on employability are described on the example of the four selected master programmes: history (HM); english language (EL); media studies (MS); and culture, environment and sustainability (CES). The present research has concluded that employability focus does not substitute the traditional humanitarian knowledge, but becomes a “linking element” and a “translation device” between the higher education and the “world of work”. Even though employability is not the primary reason students decide to study humanities, both the faculty and the programme leaders consider it important to accentuate in the humanities curricula. However, due to the low level of involvement of academics in this process it still remains much the initiative of the Faculty and the University
