High level of self-directed learning readiness among IT students at Kokkola University Consortium

For years, the IT unit of the Kokkola University Consortium Chydenius has asked students to fill in a self-directedness questionnaire during the application phase for a Master's degree. The purpose of the questionnaire is to provide students with information about self-directed learning, which is an important characteristic in higher education. From the results obtained, it can be concluded that the average level of self-directed learning readiness of students in our schools is high. This means that students are motivated, goal-oriented and take responsibility for their own progress in their studies. Our students share a high level of desire to learn and demand a lot from themselves. On the other hand, self-directed students study for themselves. They want to study according to their own criteria and goals.

The result is excellent, although not very surprising. It can be assumed that adults, people with work experience, people with previous education and people who have chosen distance learning are highly self-directed. Laatua etäopetukseen project is now investigating whether the factor structure of the selected self-directed learning readiness test matches the factor structure produced by our data. By examining the factor structure, it is possible to discover features that describe the population and even new insights into the whole latent factor under investigation, namely self-directed learning readiness.