A Study on the Field Training Supervisors’ Experience for the MZ Generation’s Practicum

The purpose of this study is to explain the changes in field training education based on the experience of field training supervisors’ to MZ generation trainees. The qualitative data were collected by in-depth interviews with 7 field training supervisors with more than 10 years of experience in field training and analyzed using a grounded theory method. The open coding analysis yielded a total of 177 concepts, 32 sub-categories, and 13 super-categories. In axial coding, the central phenomenon was ‘education that is tailored to and leads the trainees’, and the causal conditions included ‘self-centered thinking’ and ‘lack of urgency’. The contextual conditions were identified as ‘imbalance in basic competencies’ and ‘individualistic tendencies’, and the interventional conditions included ‘different attitudes depending on the purpose of the field training’ and ‘inevitable shortcomings’. The interaction strategies involved ‘downward standardization of the level of education’, ‘Lifting of regulations on limited practical training for undergraduate students’, and ‘efforts to understand the MZ generations’. The consequences indicated ‘concerns from the institution’s perspective’, ‘responsibility as a senior’, and ‘challenges of the field training from the supervisor’s perspective’. In selective coding, the core category emerged as ‘newly changing field education according to the characteristics and level of the trainees’. The field training supervisors were flexibly changing the content and method of the field education according to the characteristics and capabilities of the trainees through much trial and error. After confirming the reality of the active and responsible field education of the field supervisors, the necessity of developing a standard field education program, establishing a cooperative system between educational institutions and field institutions, creating a post-field training course for the practical capacity enhancement, and developing a single field evaluation index was suggested as an alternative for the future field practical education of the MZ generation.