In today's world, specific skills are essential for success in work and life. Educators, governments, and industry leaders recognize collaborative problem-solving (CPS) and digital skills as necessary for the 21st century. However, our current understanding of these skills' interconnection and development within technical and vocational higher education remains limited. This study aims to achieve two main objectives. First, we want to examine the level of digital skills among technical and vocational higher education students in Chile and how it relates to their socioeconomic background. Second, we aim to investigate how students' different levels of digital skills influence their satisfaction with online collaboration and their assessment of group processes after completing an online CPS task. The study identified three distinct groups of students based on their digital skills: high-skilled, medium-skilled, and low-skilled. The low-skilled group faced more socioeconomic disadvantages compared to the other two groups. Moreover, students with low digital skills reported lower satisfaction with online group work and a poorer self-evaluation of the group processes involved in the collaborative online task. Insights for technical and vocational higher education institutions to foster targeted support of digital skills development for their student body are discussed.

中文翻译：

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在线协作解决问题是技术和职业高等教育中数字技能的切实成果


在当今世界，特定技能对于工作和生活的成功至关重要。教育工作者、政府和行业领导者认识到协作解决问题 (CPS) 和数字技能是 21 世纪的必要条件。然而，我们目前对这些技能在技术和职业高等教育中的相互联系和发展的理解仍然有限。本研究旨在实现两个主要目标。首先，我们想要研究智利技术和职业高等教育学生的数字技能水平及其与他们的社会经济背景的关系。其次，我们的目的是调查学生不同水平的数字技能如何影响他们对在线协作的满意度以及完成在线 CPS 任务后对小组流程的评估。该研究根据学生的数字技能确定了三组不同的学生：高技能、中等技能和低技能。与其他两组相比，低技能群体面临更多的社会经济劣势。此外，数字技能较低的学生对在线小组工作的满意度较低，对在线协​​作任务中涉及的小组流程的自我评价较差。讨论了技术和职业高等教育机构为学生群体提供有针对性的数字技能发展支持的见解。