TopInstitutions should promote skills and attributes such as computing and information technology, critical thinking skills and collaboration that may enhance sustained learning among their students. These skills and attributes play a crucial role in enhancing sustained learning, a virtue if well-guarded would help students remain focused and persistent in learning while in college and even after they graduate from college. Institutions should, therefore, promote the development of these skills by teaching and exposing students to them since their benefits extend beyond the college environs. According to Lee (2014), “Institutional support is essential in assuring the accessibility of 21st-century training for anyone who needs it…is fundamental for achieving equity, thus giving people from different backgrounds a chance to know and raise their own voices” (p. 477).
Education excellence a virtue that all institutions should seek in order to enhance students’ intellectual and scholarly development. This will have a positive impact on their lives. (Gagnon et al., 2013; Astin, 1984, 1985, 1993). Thus, learning institutions should purposefully design students’ college experiences to promote growth and development of skills and attributes that enhanced learning. Oral (speaking), reading, and writing skills are the basic skills needed to remain focused and persistent in learning. Being able to speak clearly help articulate ideas, questions, and thoughts which in turn motivated students to keep learning. Further, good speaking skills enhance meaningful interactions with professors. Critical thinking skills are an important ingredient in learning. Critical thinking skills help students sort through information and make informed decisions and choices. Critical thinking skills, according to Pascarella and Terenzini (2005), are enhanced by coursework that requires students to use computing and information technology to analyze information, make visual displays, or search the internet.
Interpersonal and intrapersonal skills expose students to different kinds of knowledge and information, trigger interest and motivation to learn, and open learning possibilities. Learning is a personal activity and it requires a student to invest time and effort in the learning process (Gagnon et al., 2013; Astin, 1984, 1985, 1993; Yuan, 2000). Students can acquire skills and attributes that enhance learning through a variety of ways, such as courses designed to inform students about important skills, attributes, and resources available.