Rethinking Innovative Practice Competence in Professional Degree Education: An Integrated Student– Dual-Mentor–Practice-Base Framework
This study proposes and validates an integrated student–dual-mentor–practice-base framework demonstrating that innovative practice competence in professional degree education emerges from the interplay of learner agency, mentoring capability, and organizational affordances, with mentor effectiveness being significantly amplified when embedded within a supportive practice environment.
Original paper licensed under CC BY 4.0 (https://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/). This is an AI-generated explanation of the paper below. It is not written or endorsed by the authors. For technical accuracy, refer to the original paper. Read full disclaimer
In the world of higher education, a specific kind of degree has long been tasked with a difficult job: preparing students not just to know facts, but to solve real, messy problems in the workplace. Unlike traditional academic degrees that focus heavily on theory and research, these professional degrees aim to bridge the gap between the classroom and the career. For this to work, universities have adopted a system where a student is guided by two mentors: one from the university who understands the theory, and one from a company or organization who understands the daily reality of the job. They also place students in practice bases, which are real-world settings where learning happens through doing. However, simply having these people and places does not guarantee success. The critical question for educators and policymakers is how these different pieces—the student's own drive, the mentors' skills, and the environment they work in—fit together to create a truly effective learning experience.
A team of researchers from Jiangsu University in China set out to untangle this complex relationship. They were interested in a concept they call "innovative practice competence," which is essentially the ability to take what you know and use it to create new solutions or improve how things work in a professional setting. To understand how this competence develops, the researchers surveyed 184 mentors involved in these dual-mentor programs. These mentors, mostly from universities in Jiangsu Province, included both the academic supervisors and the industry supervisors who guide the students. The researchers asked them to rate various aspects of the training, from the students' initiative and problem-solving skills to the quality of the mentors' guidance and the supportiveness of the workplace environment. They then used these ratings to build a picture of how these different factors interact to determine the overall quality of the training.
The study revealed that while all three elements matter, they play different roles. The researchers found that a student's own ability to take initiative, collaborate, and persist in solving problems was the strongest single predictor of how good the training felt to the mentors. This suggests that even with excellent guidance and a great workplace, the student must be an active participant for the learning to truly take hold. However, the study also uncovered a more subtle and surprising dynamic regarding the mentors. It is a common assumption that a highly skilled mentor will directly lead to better student outcomes, as if the mentor's knowledge flows straight into the student's mind. The data, however, showed that this is only part of the story.
The researchers discovered that a mentor's competence is deeply connected to the environment in which they work. A skilled mentor does not just teach in a vacuum; they help organize the conditions that make learning possible. They connect students to real projects, secure access to necessary equipment and data, and coordinate feedback between the university and the company. In fact, the study showed that a significant portion of a mentor's positive impact on training quality happens indirectly: the mentor's skills help create a better, more supportive practice environment, and it is this improved environment that then boosts the quality of the learning. This means that a mentor's expertise is most effective when it is embedded in a system that provides authentic tasks, resources, and institutional support. If a mentor is highly capable but the workplace lacks real projects or the necessary tools, their ability to help the student is limited.
This finding challenges the idea that hiring a few brilliant mentors is enough to fix a professional degree program. Instead, it suggests that the entire system must be viewed as an interconnected ecosystem. The study indicates that to improve training quality, institutions cannot focus on mentor development in isolation. They must also strengthen the organizational conditions that allow mentors to do their best work. This includes ensuring that practice bases offer meaningful projects, that there are clear structures for feedback, and that the university and the industry partner are working in sync. The research, based on data collected in late 2024, suggests that the most successful professional education programs are those where the student's drive, the mentor's guidance, and the organization's support work together as a unified system, rather than as separate parts. By understanding this connection, universities and companies can move beyond simply checking boxes for mentorship and practice sites, and instead build the specific conditions that turn professional training into genuine, innovative capability.
Drowning in papers in your field?
Get daily digests of the most novel papers matching your research keywords — with technical summaries, in your language.