The Scholarship of Engagement for Politics: - Higher Education ...

The Value of Placement Learning
in that our students were great ambassadors for their organisations. All of
the host teams were impressed with their students – especially around how
hard they worked and how they applied themselves.
What we wanted to do most, given the fact that local government
often has difficulty recruiting into posts (we have the highest proportion of
older workers in any sector and a reputation for being rather staid and
boring) was to portray the public sector in general and local government in
particular as an interesting place to work, a place where bright young
people would choose to have a career. If just one of our six students chose
to work in local government in the future then all the effort of organising
the placement would have been worth it. What we hoped for was that they
had such a great experience they would tell all their friends and family
what a worthwhile career local government is . . . Well, one can hope!
Another ambition of ours was to promote the democratic process.
With only 35 per cent of the electorate in Coventry turning out to vote, we
wanted to encourage young people to have an interest in local politics.
Again, it’s difficult to know if we achieved this, but hopefully our students
would see the benefits of voting at local elections and encourage friends
and family to do so too.
Finally, I was greatly supported in the placement scheme by our
then Cabinet Member for People and Customer Service, Councillor
Heather Johnson. She persuaded and badgered her colleagues and senior
officers to support the programme and to meet with the students. When
asked what she wanted to achieve by the scheme she said, ‘to give the
students a positive experience – we want them to see local government as a
diverse, interesting and rewarding place and to experience politics in
action’. Based on the feedback we received, I’m certain we achieved this
goal.
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