Stakeholders' perception of competencies of aviation graduates and its implications to curriculum design

Outcome-based learning has been a focus of higher education institutions in Australia over the last 2 decades, with an aim to facilitate students to proactively navigate, explore and develop competencies required by the industry and society. Such an approach highlights the requirement for student-centred learning while at the same time poses challenges to degree programme providers to ascertain the set of desired generic- and industry-specific competencies, thus, designing a programme that is able to support students to achieve these competencies. With no professional body in Australia that currently accredits aviation programmes offered in higher education institutions, these institutions have taken their individual initiatives in the programme design, resulting in diversity in terms of course structure and curriculum. Yet, the paramount question remains to be what constitutes the generic- and aviation industry-specific set of competencies and how to determine whether the programmes are capable of facilitating the students to develop any desired competencies. This research project, undertaken jointly by Swinburne University of Technology, Griffith University and University of South Australia, will ascertain stakeholders' perception of the set of competencies required for aviation graduates at the end of their higher education, leading to the establishment of a framework to determine the set of competencies, which are consistent with the requirements set by the Australian Qualifications Framework Council (AQF) as well as the Civil Aviation Safety Authority (CASA)