changing student employer attitudes

Changing Student/Employer Attitudes and Requirements at the Placement Interface – An opportunity for discussion

Ray Wallace, School of Science & Technology, Nottingham Trent University

2ASET Integrating Work and Learning Conference 4-6th September 2007, Cardiff

First degree students in UK Higher Education Institutes on placements

0

5000

10000

15000

20000

25000

30000

35000

1998-99 1999-00 2000-01 2001-02 2002-03 2003-04 2004-05

All

Post-1992

Pre-1992

College

Source: Learning through work placement and beyond, Little & Harvey, 2006


Two interesting reports published recently

• Learning through work placements and beyond, Brenda Little & Lee Harvey, July 2006

• A degree of concern? UK first degrees in science, technology and mathematics, The Royal Society, October 2006


The first publication

• Investigates students’ perceptions of learning from placements

• Explores how values and ethical positions are developed on placement

• Investigates the extent to which students try to transfer and build on such learning in subsequent stages of the taught curriculum


The second publication

• Describes, details and incisively discusses a whole raft of topics and issues relating to first degrees in Science, Technology & Mathematics in the UK

• Pertinent to the sandwich training arena it examines STM first degrees : skills, knowledge and experience and what STM first degree graduates do


However what appears not to have been examined to any great degree with one or two notable exceptions are:

• The engagement of students with the placement process in the first place

• The expectations of employers that placement students will be literate, communicative have good subject knowledge etc

• The assumption that, for instance, with science in particular but equally with students of other disciplines such as law, business etc that they will naturally embark upon a subject discipline based placement


In this session I would like to examine these 3 areas, calling upon delegates experiences to try to tease out the critical factors that affect:

•Student engagement

•Employer expectations

•Choice of placement field


Activities

•Split into 3 groups to brainstorm/discuss the issues10 minutes

•Come together to prepare a bullet list of the key issues raised 15 minutes

•Discuss whether we want to take our pooled findings forward 5 minutes


Points to stimulate discussion – student engagement with the placement process

•Nottingham Trent University – Some figures from 2004 DLHE data

–Over 112 graduates returned to graduate roles with their placement companies

–2.4% placement students were employed in non-graduate level jobs

–44.6% of non-placement students were employed in non-graduate level jobs.



•Huddersfield University – Data from Lisa Ward, the Higher Education Academy & the Higher Education Careers Service Unit, Summer Conference, Manchester 2006

–Fewer than 50% of students enrolled on sandwich courses are taking a placement year

–Students who do a placement are more likely to:

»Gain a managerial, professional or senior official post

»Gain an associate professional or technical post

»Get any job



Most Important Factors when deciding which Graduate Employers to Apply to

Percentage of finalists looking for graduate jobs in 2005

Base – Face-to-face interviews with 16,113 final year students

Source: High Fliers Research Limited 2005

0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50%

Location of jobs

Starting salary

Content of work

Quality of training & development programme

Using degree subject studied

Work-life balance

Opportunity for overseas experiences

Achieving a professional qualification

Chance for further studies


Points to aid discussion – employer expectations

Tuesday February 20, 2007 EducationGuardian.co.uk

A senior director in a leading British company is sifting through online applications for this year's graduate jobs. Among a few outstanding applicants, and a number of obviously unsuitable candidates, he starts to notice a surprising and worrying trend.

"The applications had been sorted so that only graduates with firsts and 2:1s were being considered," he says. "And yet among those, there were a huge number of CVs that I could barely understand. The grammar and spelling were so bad, the articulation so muddled that it was a real effort to go through them. The majority of them were rejected immediately."

The example is only one way in which many leading businesses feel that applicants for graduate jobs are failing to show themselves as fit for purpose. Other attributes that make up the broad house of employability skills, such as communication, team work and business acumen, are also found to be lacking.


Points to aid discussion – employer expectations•SMEs employ more than 80% of graduates

•Charles J Watkinson, Chief Executive Corrosioneering Group (an SME)– “Our expectations of graduate applicants”

•Has interview skills! Do you always dress like that?!!

• Intelligent and logical Can understand and give instructions

•Literate “I wos not gud at spelin but I got a first in siense”

•Articulate How would you describe yourself? “What? Don’t know really”!

•Knowledgeable Can you repair a bicycle puncture? What’s a bicycle!

•Knowledgeable of their subject Well versed in the basics

•Resourceful Able to find information and resources

•Enquiring/Inquisitive Wants the whole picture, asking relevant questions

•Hard working Not waiting for the clock to go around or playing computer games


The Top 10 in 2006

Points to aid discussion – employer expectations

Skills and Attributes sought by employers in graduates

• IMPORTANT SKILLS

• Motivation & enthusiasm

• Team working

• Oral

• Communication

• Flexibility

• Customer focus

• Problem solving

• Managing own learning

• Commercial awareness

• Planning & organisation

• DIFFICULT TO FIND SKILLS

• Commercial awareness

• Leadership

• Project management

• Risk taking/enterprise

• Managing own learning

• Second language

• Problem solving

• Customer focus

• Report writing

• Cultural sensitivity


Points to aid discussion – choice of placement field

•‘What do graduates do? 2007’– Of the graduates entering employment, 52% of chemists appear to be doing jobs

with tenuous links to chemistry and 66% of biologists seem to find themselves in a similar position with regard to biology

•‘A degree of concern 2006’– The number of graduates classified as science and engineering professionals

varies significantly by subject with 35% of engineering & technology and 20% of chemistry graduates classified under this heading in 2003/4 compared with 6% of biology and 7% of physics graduates.

– Assuming that the seven ‘professional’ categories constitute ‘graduate-level’ jobs then 45% of engineering & technology graduates and 38% of chemistry, 37% of mathematics and 35% of computer science graduates, 33% of physics graduates and 20% of biology graduates are employed in graduate-level occupations six months after graduation.



Personneltoday.com - 18 May 2007

“ Students choose work experience over pay in bid to secure top jobs”

• Eight in 10 students believe work experience will help to build a career, with half certain that it will help their quest for a graduate job, new research has found.

• A survey of more than 1,200 students by career website doctorjob.com, found that only 22% selected their place of work for the money. Instead, gaining experience to help them get a job after graduation was the most important factor for 76% of respondents.

• Up to a quarter of students had worked for no wage, while 78% had worked for minimum wage or less.

• Additional reasons for taking up work experience included: how good it would look on their CV, a convenient location, getting a 'taster' of a job or sector, and gaining experience to help them get on a course.



Managers, Senior Officialsand Professionals

Associate Professional andTechnical Occupations

Administrative and SecretarialOccupations

Other Jobs

Doing Something Else

Actively Looking for Work

Placements - No

Placements - Yes

Combined data from the Schools of Applied Science, Art & Design, Computing & Engineering and Business (Source Lisa Ward the Higher Education Academy & the Higher Education Careers Service Unit, Summer Conference, Manchester 2006)

Graduate Employment Data (DLHE 2004) Huddersfield University


Thank you for your attention today

I hope that you have enjoyed the workshop

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