• Journal of the Korea Academia-Industrial cooperation Society
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• v.19 no.2
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• pp.483-496
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• 2018

NCS (National Competency Standards) has emerged as an issue of great importance amongst Korean universities and corporations. Although previously used mostly for vocational education purposes at colleges, NCS is currently receiving an increasing amount of attention from 4-year universities as well. In the ever-evolving information economy, the basic workplace skills defined by NCS, which include soft skills such as communication skills, problem-solving skills, and interpersonal skills, have now become more important than specific technical skills. This study analyzes the correlation between the basic workplace skills of NCS with participation in Formula SAE activities, a common component of Capstone design courses across North America and Europe. Data are derived from site visits to Formula SAE competitions, competition-related documents drafted by student participants, and questionnaires administered to student participants at the Formula SAE Lincoln completion and at the Korea KSAE competition. From the study findings, we claim that the basic workplace skills of NCS are closely correlated to participation in Formula SAE activities. Through a survey designed to measure the degree to which Formula SAE activities can enhance an individual's NCS Basic Workplace Skills, we find that these activities overall improved NCS basic workplace skills averaging 4.0 points above in the Likert 5-point scale. For reference the mathematical skills, communication skills, and problem-solving skills displayed statistically significantly correlation with NCS but the remaining 7 skills did not show a statistically strong correlation with NCS comparatively.