08832323.2010.492050
Journal of Education for Business
ISSN: 0883-2323 (Print) 1940-3356 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/vjeb20
Lifelong Learning: Characteristics, Skills, and
Activities for a Business College Curriculum
Douglas Love
To cite this article: Douglas Love (2011) Lifelong Learning: Characteristics, Skills, and Activities
for a Business College Curriculum, Journal of Education for Business, 86:3, 155-162, DOI:
10.1080/08832323.2010.492050
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JOURNAL OF EDUCATION FOR BUSINESS, 86: 155–162, 2011
C Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
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ISSN: 0883-2323
DOI: 10.1080/08832323.2010.492050
Lifelong Learning: Characteristics, Skills, and
Activities for a Business College Curriculum
Douglas Love
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Illinois State University, Normal, Illinois, USA
The literature places great importance on lifelong learning, but leaves its meaning open to a
wide range of interpretations. Much is written about lifelong learning after leaving school with
little about business college preparation of lifelong learners. This is the departure point for
the study’s providing one college’s operational definition of lifelong learning by identifying 8
specific characteristics the faculty said lifelong learners should possess. The authors identify
18 skills the faculty believes lead to the achievement of the lifelong learner characteristics and
describes activities that develop these skills. Other institutions may benefit by adapting the
enumerated characteristics, skills, and activities as well as the process used to determine them.
Keywords: business education, lifelong learning, lifelong learning activities, portfolio, professionalism, self directed learning
“Learning is not compulsory . . . neither is survival” (W.
Edwards Deming cited by Moyer, 2007, p. 148). “Lifelong
learning . . . is a necessity rather than a possibility or a luxury to be considered” (Fischer, 1999, p. 21). Although the
literature continues to places great importance on lifelong
learning, it also continues to leave the meaning of the term
open to a wide range of interpretations. Any institution wanting its students to possess lifelong learning skills must first
define the term. Parkinson (1999) found hundreds of citations about lifelong learning after leaving school, with few
addressing how students can be prepared for lifelong learning during secondary or postsecondary schooling. This is
the point of departure for the current study. This study provides one college’s operational definition of lifelong learning
by identifying eight specific characteristics the faculty said
lifelong learners should possess. It identifies specific skills
that the faculty believes lead to the achievement of the lifelong learner characteristics and describes how development
of these skills was integrated in the curriculum.
In the first section of the article I discuss the relevant
lifelong learning literature in an effort to make sense of the
term. In the next section I briefly describe the discovery and
consensus building steps used to obtain broad faculty agreement about an operational definition of lifelong learning and
the activities to help students master the competencies. After
Correspondence should be addressed to Douglas Love, Illinois State
University, Department of Accounting and Business Information Systems,
5520, Normal, IL 61790-5520, USA. E-mail: dolove@ilstu.edu
describing these consensus building activities, the eight lifelong learning competencies are presented. I then enumerate
skills the faculty believes lead to the achievement of the lifelong learner characteristics and show how development of
these skills were interwoven into student activities piloted in
the college curriculum. I discuss how other institutions might
use these results in the final section.
WHAT IS LIFELONG LEARNING?
The earnestness of the lifelong literature is illustrated by
the opening quotations and other authors’ descriptions of it
as essential (Wu, 2008) and a necessity for survival (Hake,
1999; Jongbloed, 2002; Kasworm & Hemmingsen, 2007).
However, the meaning of the term has many interpretations
with their own lexicons (Schraeder, Freeman, & Durham,
2007; Smith, 2001).
Lifelong learning has been equated with continuing education (Bruce, 2006) and training (Dunn, 2000). The idea of
it occurring in adulthood and spanning a life time is incorporated in Schraeder et al. (2007) citing Fellers (1996), “The
notion that a college graduate is a ‘finished good’ is being
challenged and replaced with the notion of lifelong learning;
education is a process that one continues throughout his or
her career and lifetime” (p. 45). Some argue definitions of
lifelong learning are changing in response to globalization
and other forces (De Freitas and Jameson, 2006).
Marks (2002) noted possible meanings ranging from a
“second chance access to higher education for adults wishing
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D. LOVE
to learn to short-term skilling or re-skilling for those in unstable careers and temporary jobs” (p. 1) as well as purposes
ranging “from teaching of specific ‘competencies’ of which .
. . employers can make use to learning ‘for its own sake’ and
. . . value of learned individuals to the world at large” (p. 5).
Page, Bevelander, Bond, and Boniuk (2006) observed that
the lifelong literature related to business tends to focuses on
the need for continuous training rather than “self-motivated
learning through life” (p. 2).
Jarvis (1999) distinguished between lifelong learning and
lifelong education, noting significant differences and voicing
the concern that the former term’s embracement by governments coming to be defined as work-life learning rather than
lifelong learning.
Using tools that facilitate lifelong learning sometimes
become part of its description. Certainly, information and
communications technology has broken down barriers to
lifelong learning (De Freitas & Jameson, 2006; Dykman &
Davis, 2008). Although not formally defining lifelong learning, Evans and Fan (2002) considered the use of Web-based
technology for facilitating it noting that “lifelong learning has
come to involve a variety of learning experiences or modes”
(pp. 127–128).
Attempts have been made at all encompassing definitions, such as of the European Council, cited by Lewis and
Whitlock (2002), “All learning activity undertaken throughout life, with the aim of improving knowledge, skills and
competence, within a personal, civic, social and/or employment related perspective” (p. 15). They question whether the
proposed definition is even workable. Smith (2001) questioned the term itself:
“Lifelong learning” is a general term seldom used in current
educational research. Several more precise terms are used
to better fit the conceptualization of education theorists and
researchers. . . goals of these researchers are chiefly the same:
to learn about the attributes and skills of those who take
control of their own learning, and the conditions that promote
learning development. (p. 664)
This observation may appear to be fatal for those wanting
to use the term to refer to an exit skill set graduates should
possess, however, business colleges face similar curricular
challenges on a regular basis. Globalization, diversity, and
sustainability are other examples of general terms used to
describe competencies that business colleges address. It is
necessary for those within an institution to achieve consensus
about the meaning that is presumably consistent with some
use in the literature.
Lifelong learning is often coupled with students taking
responsibility for their own learning (Taras, 2002). Dynan,
Cate, and Rhee (2008, p. 96) argued that acquisition of selfdirected learning skill (SDL) equips students to be lifelong
learners and referred to Knowles (1975) to identify SDL as
“a process in which individuals take the initiative . . . in
diagnosing their learning needs, formulating learning goals,
identifying human and material resources, choosing . . . learning strategies, and evaluating learning outcomes” (p. 18).
Some of the lifelong learner characteristics identified here
are similar to those identified by Dynan et al. (2008), but
with the explicit recognition of professional organizations as
an important source of human and material resources.
Lifelong learning also is viewed as part of being professional. Johnsson and Hager (2008) saw commitment to
lifelong learning as an essential element of fitness for professional practice. Garman, Evans, Krause, and Anfossi (2006)
examined professionalism in the health care environment,
citing the Healthcare Leadership Alliance’s definition of
its professionalism competency that includes the phrase, “a
commitment to lifelong learning.” Self managing is one of
four components of professionalism, and its focus is participating in proactive career planning and lifelong learning.
They indicated the best way to develop the competency is
to start by gaining an understanding of one’s current levels
of mastery. Assessment is identified as a significant factor
(James & Too, 2005) contributing to lifelong learning with
calls for greater student participation through self-assessment
(Taras, 2002).
The following elements from the literature figure prominently in the characteristics, skills, and activities indentified
in this study:
• Self-motivated learning throughout a lifetime;
• Self-assessment;
• Planning, including formulation of goals and identification of learning resources;
• Professionalism and mastering competencies that are of
value in the market place; and
• Learning for the value of learned individuals to the world
at large.
Even though the initial faculty consensus building activities, by design, were carried out prior to consulting the
literature, these elements found their way into the college’s
proposed lifelong learning curriculum.
BUILDING CONSENSUS BEGINNING WITH
THE MISSION STATEMENT
Initially, Illinois State University College of Business engaged in an extensive strategic planning process involving
faculty chairs of the major college teams, department chairs,
the dean, associate dean, and six additional faculty members. One outcome of this effort was this mission statement
prominently featuring lifelong learning:
To be a highly respected college of business that develops
professionals with the personal dedication, ethics and lifelong learning capabilities needed to succeed professionally
LIFELONG LEARNING
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TABLE 1
Faculty Evaluation of Lifelong Learning Characteristics
Characteristic
n
Strongly disagree and
disagree (%)
Neutral (%)
Strongly agree and agree (%)
1. A lifelong learner takes responsibility for planning
his/her own professional career path.
2. A lifelong learner understands the role of
professional organizations in lifelong learning.
3. A lifelong learner seeks certifications associated
with her/his profession.
4. A lifelong learner self-assesses, asks other to assess
her/him, reflects, and takes learning action based on
assessment and reflection.
5. A lifelong learner remains current in her or his field
and takes responsibility for identification of
knowledge deficiencies and learning opportunities.
6. A lifelong learner knows criteria that will be used to
evaluate performance and professionalism.
7. A lifelong learner has a two year postgraduation
professional development plan.
8. A lifelong learner has learning interests outside her
or his profession.
49
5
2
93
16
0
13
87
49
4
17
79
48
5
4
91
49
2
4
94
16
6
6
88
48
11
29
60
14
14
14
72
and to serve society. We work as a diverse community promoting excellence in learning, teaching, scholarship, and service.
These strategic planning activities and resulting documents at least briefly focused the entire faculty’s attention
on lifelong learning and gave responsibility for its detailed
examination to the college’s curriculum team.
The prominence of lifelong learning in the college’s mission and strategic planning documents not only demonstrated
the college leadership’s support, it also reflected an initial
step in building faculty consensus. The carefully crafted
and widely supported mission statement combined with college accrediting body’s (Association to Advance Collegiate
Schools of Business) promise to hold member institutions
accountable for fulfilling their missions were motivation for
initiating a process to assure our curriculum was contributing
to the development of student lifelong learning capabilities.
IDENTIFICATION OF LIFELONG LEARNING
CHARACTERISTICS AND SKILLS
Having stated in the college’s mission that graduates would
possess lifelong learning capabilities, the next step was to
define what this meant in practice. As customary at the college’s fall conference, faculty members, administrators, and
advisors participated in breakout sessions to address issues
associated with the strategic planning document. Three of
the breakout groups were assigned a brainstorming activity related to lifelong learning that called on members to
individually compose lists of characteristics and skills they
associated with lifelong learning capability and then use a
flip chart to record a group consensus list for reporting to all
in attendance.
Notes and flip charts from the fall conference breakout
session were given to a subgroup of the curriculum team
for analysis and development. This subgroup produced a
draft document that was reviewed by the entire curriculum
team resulting in eight characteristics of a lifelong learner
shown in the first column of Table 1. The curriculum team’s
presentation of the characteristics of a lifelong learner to the
general faculty was one of several agenda items for a spring
faculty meeting where attendees were provided a document
enumerating characteristics and describing skills of a lifelong
learner along with example skill building activities. Thirtytwo audience response devices, or clickers, were distributed
to collect real-time feedback about the curriculum team’s
propositions as each was presented.
The clicker format was novel and engaged the meeting participants in tightly focused discussions by immediately presenting quantified responses. A written form was
distributed to meeting attendees for whom clickers were
not available. Combined survey results are summarized in
Table 1. Due to meeting time constraints, two characteristics
were not polled for clicker response, but were polled with the
paper survey. This is the reason for the smaller sample sizes
for items 2 and 6.
The results were overwhelmingly supportive of the characteristics used to define lifelong learning. For ease of interpreting the responses, the five response categories were
collapsed into three. For all characteristics except the eighth,
the responses strongly agreeing exceeded the number agreeing. Although the results were still strongly supportive, the
greatest reservation was for having a 2-year professional development plan upon graduation. Some believed focusing
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D. LOVE
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TABLE 2
Eight Characteristics and Associated Skills of a Lifelong Learner
1. Takes responsibility for planning her/his professional career path.
• Can identify available career paths;
• Knows how to find needed knowledge and abilities (competencies) required for a career path;
• Knows how to find learning resources for mastering competencies;
• Understands the role of an organization’s human resources department in managing talent pools and planning for the fulfillment of future
human resource needs.
2. Understands the role of professional organizations in lifelong learning.
• Can identify professional organizations associated with her/his intended career;
• Understands the role of professional organizations in identifying knowledge/skill gaps that established professionals will encounter;
• Understands the role of professional organization as providers of education/training to address knowledge/skill gaps.
3. Seeks certifications associated with her/his profession.
• Can identify professional certifications associated with his/her profession;
• Can develop a learning path to achieving certification.
4. Self-assesses, asks other to assess her/him, reflects, and takes learning action based on assessment and reflection.
• Maintains artifacts for assessment;
• Maintains assessment outcomes;
• Maintains reflections.
5. Remains current in her/his field and takes responsibility for identification of knowledge deficiencies and learning opportunities (e.g. formal
classes, workshops, positions, mentorship relationships, self-paced courses, reading).
6. Knows criteria that will be used to evaluate performance and professionalism
• In an interview;
• In an annual review;
• In day to day business activities.
7. Has a multiyear professional development (learning) plan.
8. Has learning interests outside her or his profession and pursues those with vigor.
on job responsibilities should be the foremost priority for
new hires. Other comments noted that certifications were
not available in some disciplines, but that a lifelong learner
could still self-assess against recognized needed knowledge
and abilities to identify areas for improvement.
Another question, posed only to the clicker respondents (n
= 32), asked about the number of characteristics. A total of
60% of the clicker respondents indicated the number of characteristics was about right, 27% of the respondents indicated
there were too many characteristics, and 13% indicated there
were important characteristics that were missing. The overall
show of strong support is surprising even though respondents
participated in the flip chart brainstorming activity the prior
semester.
Based on the faculty responses in the clicker survey, the
ensuing discussion, and written feedback, the eight characteristics of a lifelong learner operationalized by specific
measurable skills are shown in Table 2. The curriculum
team’s analysis of faculty input for the first characteristic,
lifelong learner takes responsibility for planning his/her own
professional career path (characteristic 1), found the faculty believed someone possessing the characteristic must be
able to,
• Identify available career paths;
• Know how to find needed knowledge and abilities (competencies) required for a career path;
• Know how to find learning resources for mastering competencies; and
• Understand the role of a human resources department in
managing talent pools and planning for the fulfillment of
future human resource needs.
Taking responsibility for planning a career (characteristic
1) may seem obvious to seasoned professionals, but most
new graduates just have left an academic setting in which
advising center staff provided students with exact requirements for graduation and detailed plans of study, and monitored progress toward graduation. Anecdotal input from the
college’s industry advisory council members indicated that
corporations are shifting career path management responsibilities from the employer to the employee. Page et al. (2006)
noted,
Education institutions that focus more on developing selfmotivated lifelong learners play a much greater role in contributing to the business world and to society in general. They
produce individuals who develop themselves in an interorganizational rather than an intra-organizational way. Such
individuals do not rely exclusively on the firm to develop
them and, paradoxically, they thus become more valuable as
lifetime employees. (p. 1)
The role of the professional organization and certification
that is often under the auspices of the professional organizations is prominent in two of the characteristics: The lifelong
learner understands the role of the professional organizations in lifelong learning (characteristic 2) and the lifelong
learner seeks certification(s) associated with her or his profession (characteristic 3). Accounting professionals certainly
LIFELONG LEARNING
159
TABLE 3
Proposed Lifelong Learning Activities: Undergraduate COB Curriculum
Course/Year
Activity/Assignment
BUS 100
• Identify your intended profession.
• Identify professional organizations associated with your intended profession.
• Identify affiliated student chapters at the university.
• Identify needed knowledge and abilities for being successful in your intended profession.
• Examine courses in your plan of study and match courses to the needed knowledge and abilities for your intended
career.
• Identify and briefly describe certifications associated with your intended profession.
• Begin maintaining an annotated list of www pointers and other relevant resources.
• Begin maintaining completed course assignments and other artifacts that provide an indication of mastery of
knowledge and abilities relevant to intended profession.
• Revisit and revise your list of knowledge and abilities necessary for success in your intended profession.
• Examine an actual annual performance review form used by a business for an employee in your profession.
• Self-assess using your list of needed knowledge and abilities as well as the annual performance review form. In your
self-assessment, refer to the completed course assignments and other artifacts that you have been maintaining.
• Revisit and revise your list of knowledge and abilities necessary for success in your intended profession.
• Update your self-assessment.
• Reflect on strengths and areas needing improvement.
• Develop a two year postgraduation professional development plan identifying competencies to be addressed, learning
approaches to be used, and resources to be used.
• Attend speeches/workshops given by members of your intended profession.
• Maintain a journal of insights gained from attending speeches and workshops.
• Update www pointers and list of other resources relevant to your lifelong learning activities.
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Intermediate discipline specific
course or specific core course
Capstone discipline specific course
All four years
Note. New graduates of an undergraduate program will not have mastered all of the competencies required to be a lifelong learner. The undergraduate
activities are proposed to provide a foundation for a College of Business Graduate to become a lifelong learner.
are familiar with the American Institute of Certified Public
Accountants (AICPA). Among this organization’s five objectives are certification and licensing along with standards and
performance. The standards and performance objective is to
establish professional standards; assist members in continually improving their professional conduct, performance and
expertise; and monitors such performance to enforce current
standards and requirements (American Institute of Certified
Public Accountants, 2009a).
Even after graduating and achieving professional certification (characteristic 3), the lifelong learner self-assesses,
asks other to assess her or him, reflects, and takes learning
action based on assessment and reflection (characteristic 4).
The lifelong learner knows criteria that will be used to evaluate performance and professionalism (characteristic 6). The
AICPA’s recently published Core Competency Framework
for Entry into the Accounting Profession which identifies
and defines competencies needed for successfully entering
the profession is an example (American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, 2009b). In the information systems (IS) discipline, there has been longstanding cooperation among various IS professional organizations to identify
needed knowledge and abilities for working effectively in the
discipline (Association for Information Systems, 2002).
Evaluation criteria related to competencies (characteristic
6) and action in response to assessment results (characteristic
4) along with other activities undertaken to remain present
in the field (characteristic 5) are reflected in a multiyear
professional development (learning) plan (characteristic 7)
maintained by the lifelong learner.
The lifelong learner has interest outside her or his profession and pursues those with vigor (characteristic 8). To
anticipate and understand changes within a profession, the
lifelong learner must monitor and understand the broader environment (e.g. social, political, technical) surrounding the
profession.
Elements in Lifelong Learning Activities
Table 3 includes 18 elements to be incorporated in lifelong
learning activities for the undergraduate business curriculum
that are intended to develop the characteristics identified in
Table 2. The two columns of the table show the targeted
courses and the basic elements of the assignments. The initial activities the student encounters build awareness of professional organizations and needed knowledge and abilities
for various business professions. Next, the student discovers the relationships between the knowledge and abilities
required for his or her profession and the development of
these in the courses making up the student’s plan of study.
These awareness activities are intended for the first semester
the student is on campus. By early in their third year, students understand self-assessment and performance appraisal
and are actively engaged in the former. Development of
self-assessment skills sets the stage for the student to develop
a 2-year postgraduation professional development plan.
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160
D. LOVE
Some students who have piloted the professional development plan have referred to their plans when interviewing for
jobs and have asked recruiters about professional development support that organizations offer. Some students that had
already accepted job offers when the 2-year plan activity was
undertaken developed their plans in consultation with their
future employers.
At Illinois State University, BUS 100 is a 3-hr first-year
level course required for all business majors that introduces
students to the business enterprise and its functional areas
and also engages students in career planning. Table 3 indicates that activities and assignments in this course help the
student identify a profession and the organizations associated with this profession, local as well as national. Students
become aware of certifications associated with the selected
profession and needed knowledge and abilities for success.
They maintain an annotated list of Web resources and also
maintain completed assignments in this course as well as
other courses that demonstrate the level of mastery of the
needed knowledge and abilities. Of course, these BUS 100
activities could be spread among other courses at schools not
having a similar first-year course.
Activities in an intermediate course related to the student’s major call on the student to revisit the list of needed
knowledge and abilities for working effectively in her or his
intended profession and to do a self-assessment. This activity includes examination of an organization’s actual performance appraisal form for practitioners in the student’s
intended profession.
The third set of activities is intended to be part of a
discipline specific capstone course when the student is approaching graduation and therefore near entry into her/his
profession. They incorporate a reexamination of the needed
knowledge and abilities for working in the profession along
with a revision of the previous self-assessment, but also call
on the student to develop a 2-year postgraduation professional development plan. In a pilot of this activity at least
one student that had accepted a job offer for future employment worked with the employer to develop the plan. On the
first day of employment the student had a 2-year professional
development that already had the approval of the employer.
Example Assignments and Student Artifacts
The curriculum team inventoried lifelong learning skill building assignments already in the college’s curriculum and
found a series of short assignments given to BUS 100 students
to be tightly aligned with the lifelong learning elements the
team thought should be embodied in activities at that level.
Students began this series by writing a two- to three-page
“Who Am I” narrative as part of a Life Vision Portfolio.
Next, each student read about the Myers-Briggs Type indicator and completed the questionnaire to identify her or his
type. Building on these activities, each student composed a
futuristic resume. This activity required the student to think
about an intended profession and the needed knowledge and
abilities for that profession by having the student write the
resume the student would like to possess 4 years hence. As a
final activity, each student wrote a reflective narrative about
his or her ideal first job after graduation (Bantham, 2006).
The combination of activities incorporated many of the elements in the BUS 100 entry of Table 3, but in a creative way
that was more engaging than the item by item enumeration
shown in the table.
The student’s next significant encounter with lifelong
learning is a self-assessment assignment targeted for the beginning of the student’s junior year and can be placed in an
existing core course required of all business students or in
an existing intermediate discipline specific course for each
major. The activity asks the student to review descriptions
of needed knowledge and abilities compiled by professional
organizations associated with the student’s intended occupation and then draw on example experiences from her or
his course, cocurricular work, and other life experiences to
document her or his level of mastery of the various needed
knowledge and abilities. Students responded to this piloted
activity by placing their multimedia work including text,
images, sound, and links to web resources in a Web-based
portfolio system.
One student’s exemplary response identified the specific
professional organization related to her intended profession,
but indicated after a several-hour Google search she found
the career centers’ and marketing departments’ Web sites
at several universities to be the most helpful in identifying
key characteristics for her profession. She documented and
linked to six of these sites and then constructed a table showing 12 skill groups gleaned from these sites that she felt were
needed for success in her profession. She then provided extensive evidence for her level of mastery of each including
the following describing an internship experience:
This internship was largely based on my own effort, enthusiasm, and independent thinking as I had minimal instruction and supervision. I flourished in this environment . . . I
developed/improved a lot of skills while performing my job
functions: researching and identifying high net worth clients,
developing a database to manage all of the information, creating a marketing brochure for these prospects, as well as
other financial and marketing projects. I actually made such
an impression, that I would later serve as a marketing consultant from time to time . . . I was called on to “freelance”
presentation materials, marketing materials, and more.
She provided more than a dozen additional descriptions followed by a section of reflective concluding thoughts along
with links to numerous marketing organization and associations; career planning sites; and job resource sites that she
compiled. The Works Cited section for her multimedia composition contained 50 entries.
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LIFELONG LEARNING
The final significant lifelong learning development encounter is intended for the student’s last year in an existing
capstone course, either the capstone course for the student’s
major or an existing capstone course required of all business
students. The piloted capstone lifelong learning assignment
consisted of four parts intended to not only enhance selfassessment skills, but also build on those skills to create a
2-year postgraduation professional development plan. For
the first part of the assignment, the student revisited the list
of needed knowledge and abilities compiled for the earlier
lifelong learning exercises. For the second part, the student
updated the self-assessment. To provide additional foundation for the student’s self-assessment, the student is given
an actual annual employee performance evaluation form that
the student completed with self-evaluation comments. The
essence of the third and fourth parts of the piloted assignment were the following:
• Even though you may be less than a year from graduation, it is unlikely that you will be excellent in all or even
most of the areas shown in the table. Develop a plan for
enhancing your skills during the first two years after graduation. Certainly most employers will provide training in
some areas, but you are responsible for your professional
development and your future will be determined by your
own planning.
• Identify and link to Internet resources that assist in improving the skill level of the characteristics. Please be
judicious in your choice of links and limit them to the
highest quality sites.
A student’s response to a pilot of this demonstrated the assignment could be strengthened by also requesting the student to identify an intended career path with a targeted employer. The student already had accepted a job offer with a
large international equipment manufacturing company when
given the capstone assignment so he worked with his future supervisor to develop his plan. In his discussions, he
discovered that his development plan would depend on the
career path he wanted to follow within the organization, so
he first developed a 4-year company career plan. In particular, he identified a specific assignment he wanted to obtain
following the customary time in his entry position with the
company. His professional development plan targeted skills
that would help him obtain that assignment. He also identified three other professional enhancements, two involving
knowledge about technology and the other about leadership.
HOW OTHER INSTITUTIONS MIGHT USE
THESE RESULTS
Implementation of curricular change to enhance student mastery of lifelong learning skills faces two significant hurdles.
The first is that the change may involve multiple disci-
161
plines and span administrative (e.g., department) boundaries.
Clearly curricular change requiring faculty member involvement from multiple disciplines and administrative units can
present special problems. Two activities designed to engage
faculty and staff involvement at two points in the curricular
development process were employed. By design, the entire
college faculty is engaged in the initial brainstorming activity
and then in a review activity with minimal claim on participant time. Lifelong learning project champions emerge from
the initial brainstorming activities with subsequent steps encouraging their participation. This appears to be a low-cost
approach to engaging not only champions but also those that
otherwise might not participate.
A second hurdle is that faculty consensus about curricular changes may be difficult to achieve due to differences
in faculty member definitions of lifelong learning and the
competencies associated with mastering it. Because of the
interdisciplinary nature of lifelong learning and the range of
interpretations of the concept, it is unlikely that an institution
would want to attempt to address lifelong leaning by simply
implementing the pilot assignments presented here. Instead,
it may be useful to tailor the process for building faculty
consensus about lifelong learning to the institution. The institution may find it useful to provide a brief summary of the
lifelong learning literature and then poll its faculty and staff
about the characteristics in Table 2 comparing results with
those reported here. The skills and assignments presented
here can then be examined.
REFERENCES
American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. (2009a). Mission.
Retrieved from http://www.aicpa.org/About+the+AICPA/AICPA+
Mission
American Institute of Certified Public Accountants. (2009b). What is
the framework? AICPA Core Competency Framework for Entry into
the Accounting Profession. Retrieved from http://www.aicpa.org/edu/
overview.htm
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ISSN: 0883-2323 (Print) 1940-3356 (Online) Journal homepage: http://www.tandfonline.com/loi/vjeb20
Lifelong Learning: Characteristics, Skills, and
Activities for a Business College Curriculum
Douglas Love
To cite this article: Douglas Love (2011) Lifelong Learning: Characteristics, Skills, and Activities
for a Business College Curriculum, Journal of Education for Business, 86:3, 155-162, DOI:
10.1080/08832323.2010.492050
To link to this article: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/08832323.2010.492050
Published online: 24 Feb 2011.
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Date: 11 January 2016, At: 22:14
JOURNAL OF EDUCATION FOR BUSINESS, 86: 155–162, 2011
C Taylor & Francis Group, LLC
Copyright
ISSN: 0883-2323
DOI: 10.1080/08832323.2010.492050
Lifelong Learning: Characteristics, Skills, and
Activities for a Business College Curriculum
Douglas Love
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Illinois State University, Normal, Illinois, USA
The literature places great importance on lifelong learning, but leaves its meaning open to a
wide range of interpretations. Much is written about lifelong learning after leaving school with
little about business college preparation of lifelong learners. This is the departure point for
the study’s providing one college’s operational definition of lifelong learning by identifying 8
specific characteristics the faculty said lifelong learners should possess. The authors identify
18 skills the faculty believes lead to the achievement of the lifelong learner characteristics and
describes activities that develop these skills. Other institutions may benefit by adapting the
enumerated characteristics, skills, and activities as well as the process used to determine them.
Keywords: business education, lifelong learning, lifelong learning activities, portfolio, professionalism, self directed learning
“Learning is not compulsory . . . neither is survival” (W.
Edwards Deming cited by Moyer, 2007, p. 148). “Lifelong
learning . . . is a necessity rather than a possibility or a luxury to be considered” (Fischer, 1999, p. 21). Although the
literature continues to places great importance on lifelong
learning, it also continues to leave the meaning of the term
open to a wide range of interpretations. Any institution wanting its students to possess lifelong learning skills must first
define the term. Parkinson (1999) found hundreds of citations about lifelong learning after leaving school, with few
addressing how students can be prepared for lifelong learning during secondary or postsecondary schooling. This is
the point of departure for the current study. This study provides one college’s operational definition of lifelong learning
by identifying eight specific characteristics the faculty said
lifelong learners should possess. It identifies specific skills
that the faculty believes lead to the achievement of the lifelong learner characteristics and describes how development
of these skills was integrated in the curriculum.
In the first section of the article I discuss the relevant
lifelong learning literature in an effort to make sense of the
term. In the next section I briefly describe the discovery and
consensus building steps used to obtain broad faculty agreement about an operational definition of lifelong learning and
the activities to help students master the competencies. After
Correspondence should be addressed to Douglas Love, Illinois State
University, Department of Accounting and Business Information Systems,
5520, Normal, IL 61790-5520, USA. E-mail: dolove@ilstu.edu
describing these consensus building activities, the eight lifelong learning competencies are presented. I then enumerate
skills the faculty believes lead to the achievement of the lifelong learner characteristics and show how development of
these skills were interwoven into student activities piloted in
the college curriculum. I discuss how other institutions might
use these results in the final section.
WHAT IS LIFELONG LEARNING?
The earnestness of the lifelong literature is illustrated by
the opening quotations and other authors’ descriptions of it
as essential (Wu, 2008) and a necessity for survival (Hake,
1999; Jongbloed, 2002; Kasworm & Hemmingsen, 2007).
However, the meaning of the term has many interpretations
with their own lexicons (Schraeder, Freeman, & Durham,
2007; Smith, 2001).
Lifelong learning has been equated with continuing education (Bruce, 2006) and training (Dunn, 2000). The idea of
it occurring in adulthood and spanning a life time is incorporated in Schraeder et al. (2007) citing Fellers (1996), “The
notion that a college graduate is a ‘finished good’ is being
challenged and replaced with the notion of lifelong learning;
education is a process that one continues throughout his or
her career and lifetime” (p. 45). Some argue definitions of
lifelong learning are changing in response to globalization
and other forces (De Freitas and Jameson, 2006).
Marks (2002) noted possible meanings ranging from a
“second chance access to higher education for adults wishing
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to learn to short-term skilling or re-skilling for those in unstable careers and temporary jobs” (p. 1) as well as purposes
ranging “from teaching of specific ‘competencies’ of which .
. . employers can make use to learning ‘for its own sake’ and
. . . value of learned individuals to the world at large” (p. 5).
Page, Bevelander, Bond, and Boniuk (2006) observed that
the lifelong literature related to business tends to focuses on
the need for continuous training rather than “self-motivated
learning through life” (p. 2).
Jarvis (1999) distinguished between lifelong learning and
lifelong education, noting significant differences and voicing
the concern that the former term’s embracement by governments coming to be defined as work-life learning rather than
lifelong learning.
Using tools that facilitate lifelong learning sometimes
become part of its description. Certainly, information and
communications technology has broken down barriers to
lifelong learning (De Freitas & Jameson, 2006; Dykman &
Davis, 2008). Although not formally defining lifelong learning, Evans and Fan (2002) considered the use of Web-based
technology for facilitating it noting that “lifelong learning has
come to involve a variety of learning experiences or modes”
(pp. 127–128).
Attempts have been made at all encompassing definitions, such as of the European Council, cited by Lewis and
Whitlock (2002), “All learning activity undertaken throughout life, with the aim of improving knowledge, skills and
competence, within a personal, civic, social and/or employment related perspective” (p. 15). They question whether the
proposed definition is even workable. Smith (2001) questioned the term itself:
“Lifelong learning” is a general term seldom used in current
educational research. Several more precise terms are used
to better fit the conceptualization of education theorists and
researchers. . . goals of these researchers are chiefly the same:
to learn about the attributes and skills of those who take
control of their own learning, and the conditions that promote
learning development. (p. 664)
This observation may appear to be fatal for those wanting
to use the term to refer to an exit skill set graduates should
possess, however, business colleges face similar curricular
challenges on a regular basis. Globalization, diversity, and
sustainability are other examples of general terms used to
describe competencies that business colleges address. It is
necessary for those within an institution to achieve consensus
about the meaning that is presumably consistent with some
use in the literature.
Lifelong learning is often coupled with students taking
responsibility for their own learning (Taras, 2002). Dynan,
Cate, and Rhee (2008, p. 96) argued that acquisition of selfdirected learning skill (SDL) equips students to be lifelong
learners and referred to Knowles (1975) to identify SDL as
“a process in which individuals take the initiative . . . in
diagnosing their learning needs, formulating learning goals,
identifying human and material resources, choosing . . . learning strategies, and evaluating learning outcomes” (p. 18).
Some of the lifelong learner characteristics identified here
are similar to those identified by Dynan et al. (2008), but
with the explicit recognition of professional organizations as
an important source of human and material resources.
Lifelong learning also is viewed as part of being professional. Johnsson and Hager (2008) saw commitment to
lifelong learning as an essential element of fitness for professional practice. Garman, Evans, Krause, and Anfossi (2006)
examined professionalism in the health care environment,
citing the Healthcare Leadership Alliance’s definition of
its professionalism competency that includes the phrase, “a
commitment to lifelong learning.” Self managing is one of
four components of professionalism, and its focus is participating in proactive career planning and lifelong learning.
They indicated the best way to develop the competency is
to start by gaining an understanding of one’s current levels
of mastery. Assessment is identified as a significant factor
(James & Too, 2005) contributing to lifelong learning with
calls for greater student participation through self-assessment
(Taras, 2002).
The following elements from the literature figure prominently in the characteristics, skills, and activities indentified
in this study:
• Self-motivated learning throughout a lifetime;
• Self-assessment;
• Planning, including formulation of goals and identification of learning resources;
• Professionalism and mastering competencies that are of
value in the market place; and
• Learning for the value of learned individuals to the world
at large.
Even though the initial faculty consensus building activities, by design, were carried out prior to consulting the
literature, these elements found their way into the college’s
proposed lifelong learning curriculum.
BUILDING CONSENSUS BEGINNING WITH
THE MISSION STATEMENT
Initially, Illinois State University College of Business engaged in an extensive strategic planning process involving
faculty chairs of the major college teams, department chairs,
the dean, associate dean, and six additional faculty members. One outcome of this effort was this mission statement
prominently featuring lifelong learning:
To be a highly respected college of business that develops
professionals with the personal dedication, ethics and lifelong learning capabilities needed to succeed professionally
LIFELONG LEARNING
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TABLE 1
Faculty Evaluation of Lifelong Learning Characteristics
Characteristic
n
Strongly disagree and
disagree (%)
Neutral (%)
Strongly agree and agree (%)
1. A lifelong learner takes responsibility for planning
his/her own professional career path.
2. A lifelong learner understands the role of
professional organizations in lifelong learning.
3. A lifelong learner seeks certifications associated
with her/his profession.
4. A lifelong learner self-assesses, asks other to assess
her/him, reflects, and takes learning action based on
assessment and reflection.
5. A lifelong learner remains current in her or his field
and takes responsibility for identification of
knowledge deficiencies and learning opportunities.
6. A lifelong learner knows criteria that will be used to
evaluate performance and professionalism.
7. A lifelong learner has a two year postgraduation
professional development plan.
8. A lifelong learner has learning interests outside her
or his profession.
49
5
2
93
16
0
13
87
49
4
17
79
48
5
4
91
49
2
4
94
16
6
6
88
48
11
29
60
14
14
14
72
and to serve society. We work as a diverse community promoting excellence in learning, teaching, scholarship, and service.
These strategic planning activities and resulting documents at least briefly focused the entire faculty’s attention
on lifelong learning and gave responsibility for its detailed
examination to the college’s curriculum team.
The prominence of lifelong learning in the college’s mission and strategic planning documents not only demonstrated
the college leadership’s support, it also reflected an initial
step in building faculty consensus. The carefully crafted
and widely supported mission statement combined with college accrediting body’s (Association to Advance Collegiate
Schools of Business) promise to hold member institutions
accountable for fulfilling their missions were motivation for
initiating a process to assure our curriculum was contributing
to the development of student lifelong learning capabilities.
IDENTIFICATION OF LIFELONG LEARNING
CHARACTERISTICS AND SKILLS
Having stated in the college’s mission that graduates would
possess lifelong learning capabilities, the next step was to
define what this meant in practice. As customary at the college’s fall conference, faculty members, administrators, and
advisors participated in breakout sessions to address issues
associated with the strategic planning document. Three of
the breakout groups were assigned a brainstorming activity related to lifelong learning that called on members to
individually compose lists of characteristics and skills they
associated with lifelong learning capability and then use a
flip chart to record a group consensus list for reporting to all
in attendance.
Notes and flip charts from the fall conference breakout
session were given to a subgroup of the curriculum team
for analysis and development. This subgroup produced a
draft document that was reviewed by the entire curriculum
team resulting in eight characteristics of a lifelong learner
shown in the first column of Table 1. The curriculum team’s
presentation of the characteristics of a lifelong learner to the
general faculty was one of several agenda items for a spring
faculty meeting where attendees were provided a document
enumerating characteristics and describing skills of a lifelong
learner along with example skill building activities. Thirtytwo audience response devices, or clickers, were distributed
to collect real-time feedback about the curriculum team’s
propositions as each was presented.
The clicker format was novel and engaged the meeting participants in tightly focused discussions by immediately presenting quantified responses. A written form was
distributed to meeting attendees for whom clickers were
not available. Combined survey results are summarized in
Table 1. Due to meeting time constraints, two characteristics
were not polled for clicker response, but were polled with the
paper survey. This is the reason for the smaller sample sizes
for items 2 and 6.
The results were overwhelmingly supportive of the characteristics used to define lifelong learning. For ease of interpreting the responses, the five response categories were
collapsed into three. For all characteristics except the eighth,
the responses strongly agreeing exceeded the number agreeing. Although the results were still strongly supportive, the
greatest reservation was for having a 2-year professional development plan upon graduation. Some believed focusing
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TABLE 2
Eight Characteristics and Associated Skills of a Lifelong Learner
1. Takes responsibility for planning her/his professional career path.
• Can identify available career paths;
• Knows how to find needed knowledge and abilities (competencies) required for a career path;
• Knows how to find learning resources for mastering competencies;
• Understands the role of an organization’s human resources department in managing talent pools and planning for the fulfillment of future
human resource needs.
2. Understands the role of professional organizations in lifelong learning.
• Can identify professional organizations associated with her/his intended career;
• Understands the role of professional organizations in identifying knowledge/skill gaps that established professionals will encounter;
• Understands the role of professional organization as providers of education/training to address knowledge/skill gaps.
3. Seeks certifications associated with her/his profession.
• Can identify professional certifications associated with his/her profession;
• Can develop a learning path to achieving certification.
4. Self-assesses, asks other to assess her/him, reflects, and takes learning action based on assessment and reflection.
• Maintains artifacts for assessment;
• Maintains assessment outcomes;
• Maintains reflections.
5. Remains current in her/his field and takes responsibility for identification of knowledge deficiencies and learning opportunities (e.g. formal
classes, workshops, positions, mentorship relationships, self-paced courses, reading).
6. Knows criteria that will be used to evaluate performance and professionalism
• In an interview;
• In an annual review;
• In day to day business activities.
7. Has a multiyear professional development (learning) plan.
8. Has learning interests outside her or his profession and pursues those with vigor.
on job responsibilities should be the foremost priority for
new hires. Other comments noted that certifications were
not available in some disciplines, but that a lifelong learner
could still self-assess against recognized needed knowledge
and abilities to identify areas for improvement.
Another question, posed only to the clicker respondents (n
= 32), asked about the number of characteristics. A total of
60% of the clicker respondents indicated the number of characteristics was about right, 27% of the respondents indicated
there were too many characteristics, and 13% indicated there
were important characteristics that were missing. The overall
show of strong support is surprising even though respondents
participated in the flip chart brainstorming activity the prior
semester.
Based on the faculty responses in the clicker survey, the
ensuing discussion, and written feedback, the eight characteristics of a lifelong learner operationalized by specific
measurable skills are shown in Table 2. The curriculum
team’s analysis of faculty input for the first characteristic,
lifelong learner takes responsibility for planning his/her own
professional career path (characteristic 1), found the faculty believed someone possessing the characteristic must be
able to,
• Identify available career paths;
• Know how to find needed knowledge and abilities (competencies) required for a career path;
• Know how to find learning resources for mastering competencies; and
• Understand the role of a human resources department in
managing talent pools and planning for the fulfillment of
future human resource needs.
Taking responsibility for planning a career (characteristic
1) may seem obvious to seasoned professionals, but most
new graduates just have left an academic setting in which
advising center staff provided students with exact requirements for graduation and detailed plans of study, and monitored progress toward graduation. Anecdotal input from the
college’s industry advisory council members indicated that
corporations are shifting career path management responsibilities from the employer to the employee. Page et al. (2006)
noted,
Education institutions that focus more on developing selfmotivated lifelong learners play a much greater role in contributing to the business world and to society in general. They
produce individuals who develop themselves in an interorganizational rather than an intra-organizational way. Such
individuals do not rely exclusively on the firm to develop
them and, paradoxically, they thus become more valuable as
lifetime employees. (p. 1)
The role of the professional organization and certification
that is often under the auspices of the professional organizations is prominent in two of the characteristics: The lifelong
learner understands the role of the professional organizations in lifelong learning (characteristic 2) and the lifelong
learner seeks certification(s) associated with her or his profession (characteristic 3). Accounting professionals certainly
LIFELONG LEARNING
159
TABLE 3
Proposed Lifelong Learning Activities: Undergraduate COB Curriculum
Course/Year
Activity/Assignment
BUS 100
• Identify your intended profession.
• Identify professional organizations associated with your intended profession.
• Identify affiliated student chapters at the university.
• Identify needed knowledge and abilities for being successful in your intended profession.
• Examine courses in your plan of study and match courses to the needed knowledge and abilities for your intended
career.
• Identify and briefly describe certifications associated with your intended profession.
• Begin maintaining an annotated list of www pointers and other relevant resources.
• Begin maintaining completed course assignments and other artifacts that provide an indication of mastery of
knowledge and abilities relevant to intended profession.
• Revisit and revise your list of knowledge and abilities necessary for success in your intended profession.
• Examine an actual annual performance review form used by a business for an employee in your profession.
• Self-assess using your list of needed knowledge and abilities as well as the annual performance review form. In your
self-assessment, refer to the completed course assignments and other artifacts that you have been maintaining.
• Revisit and revise your list of knowledge and abilities necessary for success in your intended profession.
• Update your self-assessment.
• Reflect on strengths and areas needing improvement.
• Develop a two year postgraduation professional development plan identifying competencies to be addressed, learning
approaches to be used, and resources to be used.
• Attend speeches/workshops given by members of your intended profession.
• Maintain a journal of insights gained from attending speeches and workshops.
• Update www pointers and list of other resources relevant to your lifelong learning activities.
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Intermediate discipline specific
course or specific core course
Capstone discipline specific course
All four years
Note. New graduates of an undergraduate program will not have mastered all of the competencies required to be a lifelong learner. The undergraduate
activities are proposed to provide a foundation for a College of Business Graduate to become a lifelong learner.
are familiar with the American Institute of Certified Public
Accountants (AICPA). Among this organization’s five objectives are certification and licensing along with standards and
performance. The standards and performance objective is to
establish professional standards; assist members in continually improving their professional conduct, performance and
expertise; and monitors such performance to enforce current
standards and requirements (American Institute of Certified
Public Accountants, 2009a).
Even after graduating and achieving professional certification (characteristic 3), the lifelong learner self-assesses,
asks other to assess her or him, reflects, and takes learning
action based on assessment and reflection (characteristic 4).
The lifelong learner knows criteria that will be used to evaluate performance and professionalism (characteristic 6). The
AICPA’s recently published Core Competency Framework
for Entry into the Accounting Profession which identifies
and defines competencies needed for successfully entering
the profession is an example (American Institute of Certified Public Accountants, 2009b). In the information systems (IS) discipline, there has been longstanding cooperation among various IS professional organizations to identify
needed knowledge and abilities for working effectively in the
discipline (Association for Information Systems, 2002).
Evaluation criteria related to competencies (characteristic
6) and action in response to assessment results (characteristic
4) along with other activities undertaken to remain present
in the field (characteristic 5) are reflected in a multiyear
professional development (learning) plan (characteristic 7)
maintained by the lifelong learner.
The lifelong learner has interest outside her or his profession and pursues those with vigor (characteristic 8). To
anticipate and understand changes within a profession, the
lifelong learner must monitor and understand the broader environment (e.g. social, political, technical) surrounding the
profession.
Elements in Lifelong Learning Activities
Table 3 includes 18 elements to be incorporated in lifelong
learning activities for the undergraduate business curriculum
that are intended to develop the characteristics identified in
Table 2. The two columns of the table show the targeted
courses and the basic elements of the assignments. The initial activities the student encounters build awareness of professional organizations and needed knowledge and abilities
for various business professions. Next, the student discovers the relationships between the knowledge and abilities
required for his or her profession and the development of
these in the courses making up the student’s plan of study.
These awareness activities are intended for the first semester
the student is on campus. By early in their third year, students understand self-assessment and performance appraisal
and are actively engaged in the former. Development of
self-assessment skills sets the stage for the student to develop
a 2-year postgraduation professional development plan.
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Some students who have piloted the professional development plan have referred to their plans when interviewing for
jobs and have asked recruiters about professional development support that organizations offer. Some students that had
already accepted job offers when the 2-year plan activity was
undertaken developed their plans in consultation with their
future employers.
At Illinois State University, BUS 100 is a 3-hr first-year
level course required for all business majors that introduces
students to the business enterprise and its functional areas
and also engages students in career planning. Table 3 indicates that activities and assignments in this course help the
student identify a profession and the organizations associated with this profession, local as well as national. Students
become aware of certifications associated with the selected
profession and needed knowledge and abilities for success.
They maintain an annotated list of Web resources and also
maintain completed assignments in this course as well as
other courses that demonstrate the level of mastery of the
needed knowledge and abilities. Of course, these BUS 100
activities could be spread among other courses at schools not
having a similar first-year course.
Activities in an intermediate course related to the student’s major call on the student to revisit the list of needed
knowledge and abilities for working effectively in her or his
intended profession and to do a self-assessment. This activity includes examination of an organization’s actual performance appraisal form for practitioners in the student’s
intended profession.
The third set of activities is intended to be part of a
discipline specific capstone course when the student is approaching graduation and therefore near entry into her/his
profession. They incorporate a reexamination of the needed
knowledge and abilities for working in the profession along
with a revision of the previous self-assessment, but also call
on the student to develop a 2-year postgraduation professional development plan. In a pilot of this activity at least
one student that had accepted a job offer for future employment worked with the employer to develop the plan. On the
first day of employment the student had a 2-year professional
development that already had the approval of the employer.
Example Assignments and Student Artifacts
The curriculum team inventoried lifelong learning skill building assignments already in the college’s curriculum and
found a series of short assignments given to BUS 100 students
to be tightly aligned with the lifelong learning elements the
team thought should be embodied in activities at that level.
Students began this series by writing a two- to three-page
“Who Am I” narrative as part of a Life Vision Portfolio.
Next, each student read about the Myers-Briggs Type indicator and completed the questionnaire to identify her or his
type. Building on these activities, each student composed a
futuristic resume. This activity required the student to think
about an intended profession and the needed knowledge and
abilities for that profession by having the student write the
resume the student would like to possess 4 years hence. As a
final activity, each student wrote a reflective narrative about
his or her ideal first job after graduation (Bantham, 2006).
The combination of activities incorporated many of the elements in the BUS 100 entry of Table 3, but in a creative way
that was more engaging than the item by item enumeration
shown in the table.
The student’s next significant encounter with lifelong
learning is a self-assessment assignment targeted for the beginning of the student’s junior year and can be placed in an
existing core course required of all business students or in
an existing intermediate discipline specific course for each
major. The activity asks the student to review descriptions
of needed knowledge and abilities compiled by professional
organizations associated with the student’s intended occupation and then draw on example experiences from her or
his course, cocurricular work, and other life experiences to
document her or his level of mastery of the various needed
knowledge and abilities. Students responded to this piloted
activity by placing their multimedia work including text,
images, sound, and links to web resources in a Web-based
portfolio system.
One student’s exemplary response identified the specific
professional organization related to her intended profession,
but indicated after a several-hour Google search she found
the career centers’ and marketing departments’ Web sites
at several universities to be the most helpful in identifying
key characteristics for her profession. She documented and
linked to six of these sites and then constructed a table showing 12 skill groups gleaned from these sites that she felt were
needed for success in her profession. She then provided extensive evidence for her level of mastery of each including
the following describing an internship experience:
This internship was largely based on my own effort, enthusiasm, and independent thinking as I had minimal instruction and supervision. I flourished in this environment . . . I
developed/improved a lot of skills while performing my job
functions: researching and identifying high net worth clients,
developing a database to manage all of the information, creating a marketing brochure for these prospects, as well as
other financial and marketing projects. I actually made such
an impression, that I would later serve as a marketing consultant from time to time . . . I was called on to “freelance”
presentation materials, marketing materials, and more.
She provided more than a dozen additional descriptions followed by a section of reflective concluding thoughts along
with links to numerous marketing organization and associations; career planning sites; and job resource sites that she
compiled. The Works Cited section for her multimedia composition contained 50 entries.
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LIFELONG LEARNING
The final significant lifelong learning development encounter is intended for the student’s last year in an existing
capstone course, either the capstone course for the student’s
major or an existing capstone course required of all business
students. The piloted capstone lifelong learning assignment
consisted of four parts intended to not only enhance selfassessment skills, but also build on those skills to create a
2-year postgraduation professional development plan. For
the first part of the assignment, the student revisited the list
of needed knowledge and abilities compiled for the earlier
lifelong learning exercises. For the second part, the student
updated the self-assessment. To provide additional foundation for the student’s self-assessment, the student is given
an actual annual employee performance evaluation form that
the student completed with self-evaluation comments. The
essence of the third and fourth parts of the piloted assignment were the following:
• Even though you may be less than a year from graduation, it is unlikely that you will be excellent in all or even
most of the areas shown in the table. Develop a plan for
enhancing your skills during the first two years after graduation. Certainly most employers will provide training in
some areas, but you are responsible for your professional
development and your future will be determined by your
own planning.
• Identify and link to Internet resources that assist in improving the skill level of the characteristics. Please be
judicious in your choice of links and limit them to the
highest quality sites.
A student’s response to a pilot of this demonstrated the assignment could be strengthened by also requesting the student to identify an intended career path with a targeted employer. The student already had accepted a job offer with a
large international equipment manufacturing company when
given the capstone assignment so he worked with his future supervisor to develop his plan. In his discussions, he
discovered that his development plan would depend on the
career path he wanted to follow within the organization, so
he first developed a 4-year company career plan. In particular, he identified a specific assignment he wanted to obtain
following the customary time in his entry position with the
company. His professional development plan targeted skills
that would help him obtain that assignment. He also identified three other professional enhancements, two involving
knowledge about technology and the other about leadership.
HOW OTHER INSTITUTIONS MIGHT USE
THESE RESULTS
Implementation of curricular change to enhance student mastery of lifelong learning skills faces two significant hurdles.
The first is that the change may involve multiple disci-
161
plines and span administrative (e.g., department) boundaries.
Clearly curricular change requiring faculty member involvement from multiple disciplines and administrative units can
present special problems. Two activities designed to engage
faculty and staff involvement at two points in the curricular
development process were employed. By design, the entire
college faculty is engaged in the initial brainstorming activity
and then in a review activity with minimal claim on participant time. Lifelong learning project champions emerge from
the initial brainstorming activities with subsequent steps encouraging their participation. This appears to be a low-cost
approach to engaging not only champions but also those that
otherwise might not participate.
A second hurdle is that faculty consensus about curricular changes may be difficult to achieve due to differences
in faculty member definitions of lifelong learning and the
competencies associated with mastering it. Because of the
interdisciplinary nature of lifelong learning and the range of
interpretations of the concept, it is unlikely that an institution
would want to attempt to address lifelong leaning by simply
implementing the pilot assignments presented here. Instead,
it may be useful to tailor the process for building faculty
consensus about lifelong learning to the institution. The institution may find it useful to provide a brief summary of the
lifelong learning literature and then poll its faculty and staff
about the characteristics in Table 2 comparing results with
those reported here. The skills and assignments presented
here can then be examined.
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