Transferable skill

A transferable skill is an ability or expertise which may be used in a variety of roles or occupations. Transferable skills are those that are carried from the learning process into practical practice. These skills are believed to be vital in the academic success of a student as well as their ability to perform once in their employment roles post education. Successful navigation of the changing employment landscape will require well-developed employability skills, including career management skills. These skills demonstrate that the learner has done more than understand the information presented but can also utilize that knowledge in a real life setting to problem solve. This includes using the learned information in a manner that had not been previously utilized. Examples include communication and problem-solving. In modern education, these skills are expanded to skills that are brought into the real world through knowledge and understanding of the learned information from the educational setting. It simply boils down to being able to unpack the important pieces of knowledge through the application in the real world or an employment setting.

The defining of specific skills that are learned in education and transferred to the real or working world are widely defined. The emphasis is often on the traditional educational pillars of written and verbal communication as well as practical mathematical interpretation. However, there are additional skills that are expected of individuals as they enter the workplace that should be picked up throughout their education such as: interpersonal skills, self-management, problem solving, STEM, information technology and foreign language ability.

It should be noted that while there are defined transferable skills in education, these skills extend to ability of the individual to draw from cross-curricular areas of expertise. An example would be an individual who has picked up a world language that is not native but also has a practice skill such as engineering who has the ability to utilize both of these skill sets. This requires the ambition and cognitive drive to apply these skills in the workplace. It has been noted that it is difficult to define specific transferrable skills to a list because of the endless list of abilities that are picked up in formal and practical educational settings.

Transferrable skills have become a pillar of higher educational goals to assist the student from active learner to the utilization of the skills from academia to the real world. It has been suggested that project based learning in both high school and college lead students to an easier transition to the real world of application and work related tasks.

The practical way to determine if students can transfer skills is through project based learning that allows a student to test out the learned skill. This can be through a physical project, internship or volunteer work in the field they hope to apply the learned. There has also been a movement to encourage students to gain skills in vocational schools that give them the ability to utilize these skills in a specific subject area as well as offering them practical usage and practice while still in an education setting.

See also

• Transferable skills analysis