Assessment of Graduates of Master of Arts in Education (MAED) in one State University in the Philippines

Higher education institution, with teacher education programs, primarily aims of producing graduates having competent, qualified and 21st century skills. Tracer studies on graduates can adequately provide essential information on their profile, future plans, reasons of enrolling at the university, extent of the use of skills provided, adequacy of skills learned, degree of satisfaction in terms of services and learning environment. Descriptive research design was used in this study to describe the characteristics, abilities, preferences and perceptions of individuals. Majority of the respondents (70.6%; 60 out of 85) in the study were females, who primarily specialized in Educational Management while others pursued English, Filipino, Mathematics, Physical Education, and Technology and Home Economics. About 60% (51 out of 85) of the total respondents were in Teacher 1 and 2 or their equivalent teaching position, and about 70.6% (60 out of 85 respondents) planned to pursue doctoral program. The affordable tuition fee and the school location were the major preferred reasons for enrolling in the university. Other reasons included those skills provided by the University such as human skills, and technical, communication, leadership, research, problem solving, and ICT skills. Adequacy of skills had a positive and significant relationship to the graduates’ degree of satisfaction with services (rs = 0.603; p<.01), learning environment (rs = 0.552; p<.01), and facilities (rs = 0.527; p<.01). These results indicated that learned skills are adequate to satisfy the students concerning the general and specific services offered by the University.

Keywords: adequacy of skills, affordable tuition, great extent, graduate tracer, services