A Handbook for Teaching and Learning in Higher Education Enhancing academic and Practice

Teaching and learning for employability
❘
107
TEACHING AND LEARNING OPPORTUNITIES
In a 2007 Universities UK publication on employability, recommendation 16 states: ‘If
students are to take employability in the curriculum seriously, institutions should
consider including it in the assessment and grading process.’ However, making space in
the curriculum for accredited employability learning can conflict with perceived
disciplinary needs.
In some departments employability issues are addressed through careers sessions
within skills modules, careers sessions within discipline-specific modules (e.g. Tang and
Gan, 2005; Heard and Hole, 2006), in modules addressing preparation for work
placements (Bovea and Gallardo, 2006; Freestone and Thompson 2006), and in standalone
modules (Maguire and Guyer, 2004). Recent examples of innovative approaches and
activities may be found in Knight and Yorke (2004), Cockburn and Dunphy (2006), and
Macfarlane-Dick and Roy (2006). Careers education in higher education is generally based
broadly around a skills and competencies agenda, and sometimes theorised through the
DOTS model – Decision learning, Opportunity awareness, Transition learning and Selfawareness
(Watts, 1977; McCash, 2006).
There is real debate about the most appropriate place for such teaching and whether
it should be optional or compulsory. The regular drip, drip approach argues for small bites
in each level of study, regularly reminding students about career opportunities and
providing space for reflection on their current experiences and the skills involved. In
year-by-year engagements the focus can move from raising awareness of internships and
the local job market at level 1, preparation for work placements at level 2, to refining
techniques for graduate assessment centres and interviews at level 3. Timing is crucial,
as targeting first-year students with information about graduate employment three or
four years down the line falls on stony ground. Graduation is too far ahead for researching
graduate jobs to be meaningful.
A specialist module approach presupposes space for two to five credits of assessment
in each of three years. Where space is available for a single, 10- or 20-credit module there
are good arguments for its placement at level 2. At this stage, applying for summer
internships is a possibility, organisations which have application deadline dates in the
September before students graduate can be highlighted, and there is time for students to
undertake individual or group research projects in particular occupational sectors. For
those students who have no idea about what do next, level 2 is a good time to start
research.
Where ‘careers modules’ do exist, should they be compulsory? Short engagements in
each year taken by everyone give a consistent and benchmarked provision to every
student. The individual module is more problematic. Experience suggests that where
such modules are compulsory there is disengagement from students. ‘I know I want to
be a teacher/estate agent/accountant so I don’t need to do this module’, ‘I am not
interested in this now, I will explore the career after I have finished my degree and taken
a gap year’, and ‘I am a mature student, I have been employed for the past ten years, my