Proceedings of the 9th International Conference on Advanced Research in Teaching and Education
Year: 2024
DOI:
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The New Educational Paradigm of 21st Century Universities
Prof. Dr. Elisabeth T Pereira
ABSTRACT:
Traditionally, Higher Education Institutions (HEIs) focused on teaching discipline-specific skills (hard skills) using classical methods of instruction and assessment of the knowledge obtained by students. However, to remain competitive and aligned with evolving labor market demands, HEIs today must adopt innovative approaches to teaching, research, evaluation, and employability. The current paradigm in the 21st century, grounded in human capital theory, views education as essential to a knowledge-based global economy that addresses both present and future labor market needs. Many leading universities have undergone transformative changes that emphasize the relevance of educational programs and new teaching methodologies. These approaches incorporate innovative teaching methods and emerging technologies, which foster the development of both hard and soft skills. The present paper is structured in five sections. The first one introduces the topic and its relevance for the 21st century. The second section presents a literature review considering the previous teaching-learning methods, the factors motivating the change, and the new trends that characterize the new educational paradigm of the 21st century to face the new labor market skills and demands (like digitalization, digital communication, artificial intelligence, globalization cultures,…). The third section describes the data obtained by the project High5 in five European universities and the qualitative and quantitative methodology used to obtain the results in the fourth section. And the final section concludes.
keywords: New Educational Paradigm, Innovation, Employability, Skills, 21 century