Medicine and Health Sciences Commons^™

Poor English Language Proficiency Hinders Generic Skills Development: A Qualitative Study Of The Perspectives Of First-Year Medical Students, Michelle Mclean, Deborah Murdoch-Eaton, Sami Shaban

Michelle McLean

A number of generic skills have been identified as outcomes of higher education, largely to prepare graduates for the unpredictability of their professional practice. Generic skills include – but are not limited to – information-handling, managing learning, communication and presentation, computer literacy, critical thinking and problem-solving. After completing a quantitative validated skills audit, three cohorts of new medical students at a Gulf university (English second language learners) were surveyed for their self-identified strengths and deficiencies in terms of these generic skills. A year later, again, after completing the skills audit, they were provided with their skills list from the previous …