In the School of Business and Law the leadership on employability is at Executive level and involves both the Director of Academic Studies and Postgraduate Director in the School.
The School of Medical and Health Sciences state that for large clinical placement providers, such as the major public and private hospitals the relationship tends to be managed by the Executive Dean and the relevant discipline Associate Deans. Clinical Placement and Course Coordinators manage the relationships with the heads of discipline units within the hospital. The logistics and administration of clinical placements is managed through SONIA, the online clinical placement management system ECU uses for WIL and clinical placements.
The School of Medical and Health Sciences advise that external industry representatives on course Consultative Committees often provide useful information on potential new placement providers, or provide placements themselves. Some members have also facilitated introductions between ECU discipline staff and industry organisations.
There is an employability champion in each of the four Groups (ie Faculties) at Griffith University. For instance, in the Arts, Education, Law Faculty, employability support is managed in a partnership where the Dean Teaching and Learning, assigns Curriculum Consultants, Career Development Consultants to work with a Program Director or Course Convenor who may have indicated they would like to review program-wide employability. This approach does not cost the University more funding or resources, rather it combines key resources and support that are already available to a busy Program Director / Course Convenor and supports the provision of this activity in a Digital First approach.
Career Development Consultants contact Program Directors each year within the Account Portfolio model to influence opportunities for program-wide career development learning. As Program Directors do not meet with all Course Coordinators as part of an annual plan of curriculum renewal, the process becomes one of checking with year level coordinators, course convenors and major disciplines for known CDL or opportunities for new CDL.
Each January, all Program Directors, Heads of School Teaching and Learning and Deans Teaching and Learning are contacted by the Manager of the Careers and Employment Service with an updated list of our Digital Career Development offerings (Career Focus, Evidencing and Developing Employability Skills, Virtual Interview Training, Developing Networking Skills, ePortfolio, Writing Job Applications, LinkedIn) as well as a set menu of employability and Career Development Lecturers that can be delivered by Career Development Consultants, or a train the trainer model where teaching teams are skilled-up in the delivery of selected content where appropriate.
Yes, the dedicated WIL Office leads employability at the program level; working closely with the full-time Program Managers and other Academic and Faculty Management. The dedicated WIL Office which includes WIL Manager (1), WIL Placement Facilitators (4), WIL Assessment Facilitator (1) and an Administrator (1). The WIL Office works with student cohorts across all programs to prepare students for and secure WIL Placements (Industry Training) which is compulsory in all UG and PG programs. Across all programs, full-time Program Managers were (for the first time) appointed in 2018.
The WIL Office receives feedback from Program Managers on students and provides feedback to the Program Managers and Faculty Management from industry to inform course development.
The Program Managers and Faculty teaching staff action employability activities via the use of industry speakers, industry site visits, industry case studies and industry inspired lecturers that present across all course levels. A number of subjects also have a practical / work focus by their very nature (i.e. hospitality students will learn in our Grand Dining Room and events students will plan and deliver on-campus functions). The WIL Office provides industry contacts to facilitate such program level initiatives.
The WIL office also leads employer relationship development (via functions, visits) with support from the Program Managers and Faculty teaching staff.
The Learning and Teaching Policy is the central policy by which all SAE curriculum is designed and delivered. This policy clearly outlines the employability agenda of the Institute. This policy is under the purview of the SAE Academic Board.
SAE’s Academic Governance framework is supported in operation by the Directorate of Academic and Student Services, under the leadership of the Dean.
It is not possible to provide specific time allocations or job descriptions specifically for employability as it is embedded in the duties of most of the employees of the Institute.
Within each School, WIL/Placement staff structure curriculum toward developing student employability skills. They do this through connecting with industry, preparing students for placement, connecting with the Careers and Employability team, the Engagement team, setting appropriate assessments and continuously evaluating and improving their programs. Examples of what this looks like include:
School of Business and Tourism (SBaT) WIL Team (2.6 FTE) but others in the school include employability activities in their teaching. (Lecturer / Work Integrated Learning Coordinator)
The Hotel School (Sydney & Melbourne): 1.8 FTE (Career Consultants = 0.8, Industry Engagement Manager=1FTE) + academic staff
School of Arts and Social Sciences (SASS): One staff member coordinates placements for Social Welfare and Social Work students. As with SBaT, there are also units such as Professional Placement, Community History Research Project, Community Engagement Project in which partnerships between students and external partners are the responsibility of the Unit Assessor.
School of Health and Human Sciences, Occupational Therapy: Professional Experience team and academics facilitate a wide range of community-engaged learning experiences across the 4-year BOT program and evaluate/report on graduate outcomes to accrediting bodies and other key stakeholders each year. Bi-annual course advisory committee (employers, consumers and external key stakeholders provide input, advise on matters related to employability. Curriculum is modified accordingly regularly as per advice of external stakeholders).
Nursing: 1 x Professional Experience Lecturer+ 3 FTE PEL
Midwifery: 1 x Professional Experience Lecturer
Sport & Exercise Science: 1 Unit Assessor
School of Law and Justice: Course Coordinator in collaboration with the Unit Assessor of the School's WIL units. These two staff members work collaboratively to define appropriate employability sessions for inclusion within the School's compulsory residential program. Both then liaise with colleagues in Careers & Employability to implement these sessions.
Education: 4 FTE
ESE: 1 Unit Assessor
As stated in responses to 2.1 and 2.2 the leadership of employability at a program level is concentrated largely within Faculty. As detailed the role of the ADLI working with Academic Departments (so Department Chairs, Deputy Chairs, Course Directors and Discipline Leaders) and Research Centres, ensures that research, engagement and other strategic imperatives of the University contribute and link with the teaching programs. The Course Team led by the Course Director within the Faculty is responsible for continuous improvement of Course Learning Outcomes that align with industry and graduate requirements and Swinburne's strategic directions.
For Professional Placement each professional/internship placement student would have: -
*An Academic Supervisor from their Faculty;
*An Industry Supervisor; and
*Placement/Internship Management from the Professional Placements Office
The Professional Placement Timeline would be as follows:
Professional Placement team manages process for placement, selection of student, agreements (Swinburne Advantage)
Academic Supervisor completes Training module (Faculty)
Student commences placement
Faculty WIL Coordinator allocates Academic Supervisor to each placement (Faculty)
Academic Supervisor makes initial contact with student (Faculty)
Professional Placement Team maintains contact with workplace (Swinburne Advantage)
Student completes Task 1
Assessment 1 (Placement Development Plan) complete
Academic Supervisor provides feedback to student (Faculty)
Academic Supervisor visits student (Faculty)
Student completes Task 2 & 3
Academic Supervisor & Industry Supervisor sign off (Faculty)
Assessment 2 completes (Presentation)
Student completes evaluation survey
Assessment 3 completes (Journal)
Academic Supervisor submits results (Faculty)
Student concludes placement
At any stage in this process the student would also be able to avail themselves of University support services provided by Student Engagement team.
Associate Deans Academic provide direction for the employability agenda within a Faculty, with Heads of School and Program Directors leading on the implementation and integration of employability within a particular degree program.
The unique needs of particular disciplines and schools, including the structure of some degree programs, and the devolved nature of UQ means that much of the leadership around employability is taken on by staff within Faculties rather than centrally. UQ recognises that the this devolved structure does not easily facilitate consistency of leadership at this level. As such, the Collaborative Agreements attempt to provide surety and consistency across UQ, however they may benefit from further consideration or development to facilitate a more granular understanding of employability leadership across UQ.
There are processes currently in development to rationalise and simplify program structures to enable clarity of learning outcomes, especially in the employability and entrepreneurship spaces. The operationalisation of the embedded model with central staff being deployed locally in Faculties and the establishment of Collaborative Agreements between the Student Employability Centre and Faculties should enable more consistent messaging and delivery of employability services from 2019 onwards.
In FABL there are a number of staff who are responsible for coordinating the matching of students with the most suitable host organisation for their WIL placement to ensure an effective outcome for both student and host organisation. For some staff this is a small (but key) part of their role (these are staff whose primary responsibility is teaching) while for other staff (e.g.: Social Work Field Education Coordinators such as Gerard Jeffries) this is the predominant focus of their role.
Each school is working towards embedding employability at the program level, however this is still not consistent.
An example of embedding employability throughout the program curriculum is the Bachelor of Business (Marketing) in which the capstone course of the program MKG324 includes several topics designed to prepare marketing students for employment upon graduation. Topics covered in this course include:
*Marketing YOU in the 21st Century
*Your future: Starting your own business
*Your future: Education and training course summary
FoSHEE
Within FoSHEE, most WIL opportunities are embedded within courses in programs, although some are outside defined courses but are a program graduation requirement. A significant number of our Programs are externally professionally accredited and have specific requirements about WIL and placement experiences. Additional programs have an internal requirement for a WIL, fieldwork or research project course. These WIL opportunities give students the opportunity to effectively integrate and apply theoretical and practical aspects of their study in intellectually stimulating and supportive experiences within a relevant workplace. Under these arrangements students can gain the skills they need to transition successfully from study to work, while giving industry the opportunity to enrich student learning experiences and increase the number of work-ready graduates. See 1.8c.
Evidence:
2.3a FoSHEE example of embedding employability: Bachelor of Occupational Therapy (Honours)
There is leadership on the employability agenda at a program level, while theses roles have other responsibilities, employability is included in their roles at a program level. This includes:
- Course Coordinators in all final year programs are responsibility for leadership of employability for their programs
- Lead Clinical Educator roles
- Academic Coordinator roles
- Professional Experience Coordinators
- Course Coordinator PWE3000
- WIL Coordinators
- The Divisional Research & research Training Committee (DRRTC) (co-chaired by Aravinthan and Danaher) meets monthly and includes research coordinators representing each discipline area. They can be encouraged to be champions and advisors in regards to the employability agenda
Placement coordinators operate at program (course) level (e.g. social work, pharmacy) but also some operate at College level (e.g. director of PEP) WIL is embedded in curriculum design (course coordinator responsibility)
Yes, this is different for each programme. There are a myriad of ways the employability agenda is addressed at a programme level but role titles are not standardised so it is not clearly evident where this responsibility lies.
For example, the Engineering programme spine has employability characteristics as part of the programme. The programme director takes leadership in ensuring that employability skills are part of the programme and a number of staff contribute to explicit parts of the programme which are designed to improve employability skills.
There are approximately 60 Directors of Academic Programs (DAPS) across the university and as stated before some schools have created more focussed positions such as the Director of Professional Experience in the School of Education or the Director of Engagement in the School of Humanities and Arts.
The Head of Industry Engagement and Industry Engagement team roles encompass some of the agenda. However this is not directed at the institution level
There is no formal leadership on the employability agenda at a program/course level. Instead, each major/degree has a Course Director who has responsibility for overseeing the scaffolding of learning/structure of that course. To date, and in general terms, leadership on the employability agenda at course level has been variable; it has been supplemented in a number of cases by individual academics/tutors taking the lead on including employability learning or an employability related assessment task at unit level.
For professionally accredited courses student employability is often more explicit, captured by a range of work integrated learning activities such as: Accreditation-related work placements, Clinical placements, Clinical practicums, Clinical education, Clinicals experience, Practical placements, Practicum, Practicum placements, Research practicum, and Teaching professional practice.
The activation of employability is inferred in role descriptors such as: innovative course design, assuring student experience/success and achievement of graduate capabilities / course learning outcomes etc for Course Convenors, Associate Deans Learning and Teaching and Learning and Teaching Directors.
For example, the role description for the Director, Learning and Teaching in the Faculty of Business and Economics includes: to design, implement, evaluate and enhance programs to support both the student learning experience and the staff teaching experience. The position provides leadership and management of professional development for staff in learning and teaching, grants and awards, student experience programs and strategic learning and teaching initiatives.
Career Development Consultants (within each Faculty) are informal advocates for employability at Faculty level and have a dotted line report to the Faculty's Associate Dean of Learning and Teaching. They may have some influence on the Faculty's employability agenda however this varies across the institution and is not well reflected at program or course level.
There is no dedicated leadership, although there are some programs where certain staff may take the lead in embedding aspects of employability in a course or unit of study.
No, but a representative from science and engineering both have leadership roles (in addition to their unit coordinator responsibilities) in guiding the strategic direction in both embedded and placement WIL activities. Both of these representatives are part of the WIL Strategy Working Group as well.
Work Integrated Learning (including placements) is the key component of employability that is driven at the course level. These roles include academic as well as professional staff. Due to the way in which the Employability Strategy is implemented, the college leadership teams are also involved in enhancing programs and implementing career development learning. These typically include Deans, Directors of Learning & Teaching as well as Course Chairs and Discipline Leads.
There is no delegated leadership of employability at a program level although Health Sciences employ clinical directors at a discipline level in order to meet professional accreditation requirements. With the expertise of several Curtin staff internationally recognised as leaders in employability and WIL, informal leadership and collaboration features widely.
Not at the present time