Self-assessment of the digital skills of career education specialists during the provision of remote services
Abstract
The drastic and structural changes in the labour market and organisational environment related not only to the COVID-19 pandemic and rapid technological development, but also to general globalisation trends, demographic situation deterioration and dynamic changes at all levels of education emphasise the need for qualitative career education and guidance in secondary schools. Career education and guidance events in Latvian schools are organised in different ways, but since 2016 a huge contribution has been made by the European Social Fund project “Career Support in General and Vocational Education Institutions”. This programme implements various comprehensive career activities to promote the development of students’ understanding of their abilities, skills and assessments, as well as to help them set and manage career goals. It also promotes knowledge and understanding of the world of work, thus ensuring continuous development of career skills, successful choice of further education and successful entry into the labour market. The situation caused by the COVID-19 pandemic not only created the need to remotely organise the learning process but also to transfer all career guidance activities—educational classes, lectures, seminars, consultations, testing, excursions, etc.—to a virtual environment.
As career guidance professionals worked with students primarily in person before the pandemic, the issue of the digital skills of career guidance specialists became topical to ensure continuous career guidance. Not all career professionals were able to reorient their work remotely. In e-learning education circumstances, career guidance professionals need to assess and develop their digital skills and literacy, find and compile the necessary materials and different e-tools and become creators of digital content themselves.
The aim of this study is to explore the digital self-assessment of career guidance professionals and to determine the following: How do career guidance professionals use digital technology to deliver career guidance services? How do professionals view the potential of digital tools to provide career skills development? How do career guidance professionals evaluate their digital literacy?
The authors gathered and analysed both quantitative (closed-ended) and qualitative (open-ended) data from several sources, including a survey of 66 career guidance practitioners (career counsellors, educators-career counsellors, teachers) and online expert interviews with 5 leading career guidance professionals from Latvia.
The survey and expert interview results showed that career guidance professionals engaged remotely during the COVID-19 pandemic using virtual platforms and different tools. In the self-assessment of digital literacy, career guidance professionals recognise that they have a high level of skill in selecting and compiling digital resources for career choices and in collecting and compiling a variety of data on the career guidance process. Their use of various digital tools for communication and interactive tests for obtaining feedback is also not a problem.
It is necessary to improve their ability to use various digital counselling techniques, to assess the reliability of sources, to use video opportunities more widely and to create their own career education and counselling materials. Experts point to the need to develop digital skills in career guidance to be able to use the combination of online and in-person career guidance in the future, seeing its great potential.
The data obtained from the research will help improve the professional development programmes of career guidance professionals.
