Prospective Teachers, Generic Skills, and Student Community Service Program: A Case Study in the Indonesian Context

Abstract

Many papers have been published in recent years describing prospective teachers` generic and teaching skills. However, to our best knowledge, little is known about how they acquire and apply these skills in real-life situations outside of the classroom, among communities through student community service program in particular. In other words, because empirical evidence in the literature has failed to recognise the implementation of prospective teachers’ generic skills among communities, the question on this topic remains open. Therefore, our purpose was to explore and describe prospective teachers’ generic skills when taking part in a community service program. This study is qualitative in nature, with a total of 150 students consisting of 100 females (67%) and 50 males (33%) enrolled at the Faculty of Teacher Training and Education in a public university in Indonesia participating by adopting a questionnaire and audio-recorded interviews for data collection. The data collected through questionnaire were analyzed using descriptive statistics, while the information collected through the interviews was evaluated and interpreted using content analysis through coding classification and theme or pattern identification, with the goal of providing thorough descriptive interpretations of social phenomena. The findings reveal that the prospective teachers under investigation strongly agree and agree that community service program has benefited them personally, socially, and professionally, as well as improved their generic skills. They could develop their generic skills while participating in a student community service program. The findings of this study provide clear evidence that generic skills and the development of these skills are deemed important by students enrolled at teacher training and education. Based on the findings, the implications and limitations of this present study with several suggestions for future research are also discussed.