In the 21 st century, information and communications technologies (ICT) have altered every aspect of society, from the way of interaction and work to the educational system. There have arisen significant changes due to technological advancements, globalization, institutional constraints, and social alterations (Sen et al., 2018). In the educational sphere, besides the factors above, changes are also driven by technological innovations, hypercompetition, and advancements in education (Alpaydin & Demirli, n.d.). Extensive developments of technology have propelled changes in education, as in the changing role of a teacher in the 21 st century, who is expected to be more forward-thinking, curious, and flexible (Sulaiman & Ismail, 2020). The traditional teacher-centered approach, passive learning, and time-based, textbook-driven, fragmented curriculum do not seem to cater to the learning needs of 21 st century students (Reiter, 2017).

In the 21^st century, learning involves a higher degree of collaboration and partnership between the teacher and students than learning in the traditional way, where the teacher acts as the primary decision-maker for the students (Syahputra, 2018-11) (Indriastuti, 2022). Students now are more intelligent, independent, extremely capable, technologically savvy, and comfortable with global and intercultural communication (Strauss & Camins, 2015).

The challenge faced by prospective teachers in teaching students in 21 st century education is about giving students the skills they need to succeed in this new world and helping them grow the confidence to practice those skills (Zamora & Zamora, 2022)(Yusuf, 2022). Teachers in the 21 st century need to act as facilitators, guide students to learn and explore on their own (Strauss & Camins, 2015), maintain students' intrinsic and extrinsic motivation during lessons (Azzahro’ et al., 2021), guide students in understanding and utilizing digital resources wisely (Tarihoran, 2019), and master 21 st century skills (Thornhill-Miller et al., 2023). Honing 21 st century skills is essential to ensure that students are prepared for college, career, and civic life.

As teachers act as role-models and learning facilitators for their students, it is vital for them to be equipped with the digital competence necessary for all citizens to be able to adapt and actively participate in a digital society (Redecker & Punie, 2017)(Asiyah, 2018) and to prepare them for future workforce (Tondeur et al., 2023). In addition to becoming digitally literate, teachers should also encourage their students' digital competence and take advantage of digital technologies' potential to improve and innovate teaching (Ghomi & Redecker, 2019). Teachers must maintain their digital literacy to be able to search for information, gather it, and analyze it critically, and to create tools and use a range of web-based services (Muammar et al., 2023).

Digital competence for teachers refers to the collection of knowledge, skills, and attitudes that teachers must possess to be able to integrate and use technology appropriately and effectively to achieve their goals (Sen et al., 2018). It is an essential competence that teachers must master in today's society, as digital capabilities have become very important in the context of education (Baskaran et al., 2019). Digital competence for teachers is critical to the success of the education system, and it is important for initial and ongoing training for teachers to ensure that they have the necessary digital competence (Caena & Redecker, 2019)(Shadiev & Wang, 2022), including the ability to create and edit digital content, ensuring digital security, and problem-solving skills ((Chai & Kong, 2017);(Maghfiroh et al., 2020);(Niyazova et al., 2023)).

Consequently, higher education, particularly faculties of education, needs to ensure that students as prospective teachers are equipped with the digital competence referred to earlier to participate in society, both personally and professionally (Astuti et al., 2019). Thus, it is critical to measure the level of digital competence of final semester students in the education department as prospective teachers in order to ascertain whether their digital competence meets the standards required for teaching in the 21 st century. The results of this study will provide input for the study program regarding student needs for digital technology course materials so that students may gain sufficient competence to design and organize activities based on technology and to carry out cooperative learning in the classroom.

This study adopts the European Framework for the Digital Competence of Educators (DigCompEdu) with a total of 22 competences designed to capture and describe educator-specific digital competences necessary to effectively use digital technologies for teaching (Redecker & Punie, 2017). The instrument consists of 22 items on professional engagement (4 questions), digital resources (3 questions), teaching and learning (4 questions), assessment (3 questions), empowerment of learners (3 questions), and facilitation of learners' digital competence (5 questions). The entire instrument items are used by teachers to self-assess their individual strengths and learning needs ((Ghomi & Redecker, 2019); (Yang et al., 2022)). However, in this study, the researchers focused only on 6 competences (teaching, guidance, collaborative learning, self-regulated learning, assessment strategies, and feedback and planning). For greater clarity, the 6 competencies examined in this study can be explained in Figure 1.

To sum up, this study aims to find out prospective teachers’ digital competence levels, particularly on educator’ pedagogic competence related to digital resources, and to explain how they perceived their teaching readiness in the 21^st century. The research questions guiding the current research are as follows: (i) What is the digital competence level of prospective teachers? (ii) How ready are students to teach in the 21^st century? This study will help the participants (prospective teachers) reflect on their strengths and weaknesses in using and integrating digital technology in the teaching and learning process. The results of this study will generate insights into prospective teachers’ digital competence in education and help design in-service teachers’ instructional media courses.

The data from the responses to the questionnaire on the digital competence of pre-service teachers are presented in Figure 2. The data are detailed as follows: 2 participants (5.71%) were at level A1, 13 participants (37.1%) were at level A2, 7 participants (20%) were at level B1, 9 participants (25.7%) were at level B2, 1 participant (2.86%) was at level C1, and 3 participants (8.57%) were at level C2. It shows that most of the respondents were making basic use of available digital technologies for instruction, integrating available digital technologies meaningfully into the teaching process, and using digital technologies purposefully to enhance pedagogic strategies. Very few of them were orchestrating, monitoring, and flexibly adapting the use of digital technologies to enhance pedagogic strategies and using digital technologies to innovate teaching strategies.

The results for the guidance competence are as follows: 2 participants (5.71%) were at level A1, 9 participants (25.7%) were at level A2, 7 participants (20%) were at level B1, 12 participants (34.3%) were at level B2, 3 participants (8.57%) were at level C1, and 2 participants (5.71%) were at level C2. These results indicate that most of these prospective teachers were employing basic digital strategies to interact with learners, using digital technologies to enhance interaction with learners, and using digital technologies to enhance monitoring and guidance. Only a few of them were employing digital technologies strategically and purposefully to provide guidance and support and using digital technologies to innovate guidance provision.

The results for the collaborative learning competence are as follows: no participant (0%) was at level A1, 13 participants (37.1%) were at level A2, 11 participants (31.4%) were at level B1, 2 participants (5.7%) were at level B2, 6 participants (17.1%) were at level C1, and 3 participants (8.6%) were at level C2. These results show that the participants were encouraging learners to use digital technologies in their collaborative activities, implementing digital technologies into the design of collaborative activities, and using digital environments for learners’ collaborative knowledge generation and peer assessment. The fact that no one was at level A1 is a good thing, yet very few were at level B2 and level C2, meaning that not many of the participants were using digital environments to support collaborative learning and using digital technologies to innovate learner collaboration.

For the self-regulated learning competence, the results were as follows: 1 participant (2.9%) was at level A1, 13 participants (37.1%) were at level A2, 10 participants (28.6%) were at level B1, 6 participants (17%) were at level B2, 4 participants (11.4%) were at level C1, and 1 participant (2.9%) was at level with C2. Based on these results, the participants were encouraging learners to use digital technologies in self-regulated learning activities, implementing digital technologies into the design of self-regulated learning activities, and using digital environments to comprehensively support self-regulated learning.

For the assessment strategies competence, the results were as follows: 3 participants (8.6%) were at level A1, 9 participants (26%) were at level A2, 10 participants (23%) were at level B1, 4 participants (11%) were at level B2, 7 participants (20%) were at level C1, and 2 participants (5.7%) were at level C2. The data show that the participants mostly were integrating digital technologies into traditional assessment strategies, employing and modifying existing digital assessment tools and formats, and comprehensively and critically selecting, creating, and adapting digital assessment formats. Few of them were strategically using a range of digital assessment formats and developing innovative assessment formats using digital technologies.

For the feedback & planning competence, the results were as follows: 1 participant (2.9%) was at level A1, 4 participants (11%) were at level A2, 11 participants (31%) were at level B1, 10 participants (29%) were at level B2, 3 participants (8.%) were at level C1, and participants (17%) were at level C2.The last results indicate that mostly the participants were using digital technologies to inform and provide feedback, using digital data to enhance the effectiveness of feedback and support, and using digital data to evaluate and improve teaching. Very few of them were using digital technologies to personalize feedback and support.

From the data of each category above, it can be concluded that generally the participants (prospective teachers) were at B1/Integrator level (46%), showing that they were eager to add new workouts to their repertoire ( Figure 3). However, the best tools to use in specific situations, as well as integration of digital technology with educational strategies and practices, still need working out. Integrators only require additional time for inquiry and reflection, as well as for group support and knowledge exchange, to advance to the status of Experts. In addition, 28% of the participants were at A2/Explorer level. Since they were aware of their potential, the participants were interested in adopting digital technologies to enhance professional and educational practice as explorers. They had started using digital technology in a few areas of digital competency, but they had yet to develop a comprehensive or consistent plan. The leadership and guidance of peers, rooted in a cooperative exchange of practices, could provide the support, knowledge, and inspiration that they needed.

In the 21^st century, digital competence becomes an important aspect to develop for prospective teachers. This study used a standardized questionnaire based on a validated DigCompEdu framework developed by Redecker & Punie. A total of 22 competencies are contained in the DigCompEdu framework, but the researchers only focused on 6 competencies in this study: teaching, guidance, collaborative learning, self-regulated learning competence, assessment strategies, and feedback and planning. The questionnaire was combined with several open-ended questions asking about prospective teachers’ readiness to teach in the 21^st century. This study involved prospective teachers’ self-assessment of their own strengths and weaknesses in using digital technology in the teaching and learning process.

Additionally, this study measured learning outcomes from instructional media courses and internship programs. The study provides input for the study program for the improvement of the courses and programs and for the development of prospective teachers’ digital competence to prepare skilled teachers in the 21^st century. The limitation of this study was that the number of respondents was too small to meet the researchers’ need due to the very low response rate of the participants to the online questionnaires. A larger sample size would enable a deeper quantitative analysis and, therefore, a deeper qualitative analysis.