Understanding and identifying the professional development needs of 4-H youth development professionals should be the first step in developing the Extension workforce. However, 4-H professionals find it challenging to use the Professional, Research, Knowledge and Competencies (PRKC), which consists of 348 unique competency items, to guide…

Due to the nature of Extension, work across counties differs because efforts are grounded in the needs of a community and intentional programming helps address these needs. A common competency required for entry-stage Extension professionals is program development, which includes planning, design, implementation, and evaluation. Understanding a…

Our nation's economy and global competitiveness depend on an educated, skilled workforce that can quickly adapt to changes in technology and business processes. Adult educators understand that adult learners need opportunities to obtain workplace and career management skills through work-based learning experiences that prepare them for the complex…

China is expected to have a rapid growth in specialized early intervention (EI) services for young children ages birth to 6 and their families. A major barrier in the provision of EI services in China is the shortage of well-trained EI personnel. In 2013, a Home-Based Early Intervention Program (HBEIP) was started at South China Normal University…

Background: Environmental health, a crucial part of our everyday lives, is a multidisciplinary field with many discrepancies as to what encompasses the core areas. Purpose: This study intended to establish core areas and corresponding topics of environmental health as a preliminary step to identifying knowledge, attitude and behavior questions for…

Strategies for establishing and maintaining an effective vocational assessment program for students with learning disabilities involve highlighting the school motivation and career planning connection, securing administrative support, conducting a needs assessment, communicating goals, maintaining open communication with school personnel,…

The staff of the Young Adult Training Center, Columbia, Missouri, used Canfield's Learning Styles Inventory to select enrollees for its training programs and to modify instructional strategies based on learner needs. The three vocational skill training programs involved were retail sales, building trades, and data entry. (CT)

To ensure that the new physical therapist assistant (PTA) curriculum at Allegany Community College (Maryland) met current professional needs, a survey was undertaken of establishments likely to employ PTAs. An employer needs questionnaire was returned by 272 establishments (of 1,250 surveyed). Findings indicated that more than half of the…

Describes a planning system to meet the training requirements of specialized project personnel. This training planning system provides for an organized assessment of personnel training needs and the use of all available training media. It also provides mechanisms to document acquired training and to develop new training resources. (EM)

An exploratory study was conducted to evaluate the feasibility of determining the reading demands of navy jobs, using a methodology that identifies both the type of reading tasks performed on the job and the level of general reading skill required to perform that set of reading tasks. Next, a survey was made of the navy's job skills training…

This report describes a project that adopted a curriculum development approach to meet the education and training needs of the unemployed and other disadvantaged groups in Birmingham, England. Chapter 1 gives the project's purpose. Chapter 2 sets the project in its context--an outer city area. Chapter 3 describes the processes of analyzing needs…

This monograph, organized in two major parts, covers the role of educational needs assessment in adult education and its role in continuing medical education (CME). The first part discusses the concept of educational need and its relationship to classic program planning models and naturalistic program planning. It then covers various assessment…

This paper describes the activities of 50 rural special education teachers in providing life survival skills education to secondary learning disabled and behaviorally disturbed students as part of a special education inservice program at a land grant university. The program offered a yearlong, 9 credit hour, sequence of courses, which included…

This look at competency-based education (CBE) begins by defining competency-based training. The five essential elements are discussed--competencies, criterion-referenced evaluation, provision for individual development and evaluation, requirement of student performance, and student-paced instruction. Facilitating or supporting characteristics are…

This module, one in a series of competency-based guidance program training packages, focuses on specific professional and paraprofessional competencies of guidance personnel. Modules in Category C suggest how to conduct, accomplish, or carry out selected career guidance program activities. The purpose of this module is to help career guidance…