From mountaintop to corporate ladder – what new professionals really really want in a capstone experience!

Abstract

Capstone subjects are increasingly used in Universities worldwide to complete the undergraduate program experience and to transition graduates into the workplace. As such, capstones fulfil a large role consolidating one experience and traversing the gap to another. Yet, little is known or understood about their design, their implementation or evaluation. In this study we investigate the final-year experience from the student's perspective. We surveyed graduates from five Business Schools in Australia to identify perceptions of their final-year experience. Findings indicate that the transition experience of the student to professional is unique. In their liminal or intermediate state between student and professional they recognise the value of process skills, in particular the development of generic business skills related to application and the importance of opportunities for experiencing the application of theory in practice. The findings add a new understanding to the current literature which has not previously acknowledged the insight of the transitioning professional.

Keywords:

• capstone courses
• assuring learning
• transition to work

Acknowledgement

We acknowledge the contributions of the team members: Elizabeth van Acker and Janis Bailey (co-leaders), and Lorelle Frazer, Jacqui Fyffe, Ray Hibbins and Keithia Wilson (Griffith University); Leigh Wood (Macquarie University); Lynda Andrews and Erica French (QUT); Johanna Macneil and Jim Psaros (University of Newcastle); Jan Turbill and Michael Zanko (University of Wollongong).

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the authors.

Funding

The Australian Learning and Teaching Council (now Office of Learning and Teaching) funded Priority Program Grant PP10–1646 ‘Capstone Courses in Undergraduate Business Degrees: Better Course Design, Better Learning Activities, Better Assessment’.