Tuesday, November 20, 2012 1 ALT-C 2012

Practical ePortfolios: Embedding

placement reflection and personal

development processes

Kirstie Coolin

Centre for International ePortfolio Development, (CIePD)

Libraries, Research & Learning Resources

www.nottingham.ac.uk/eportfolio

@ciepd

@kirstie_c

Overview

• Employability skills plus professional learning

• Opportunities for learning about work

• Employer involvement

• Combining career learning and PDP – an

example from Nottingham

• Interaction with employers

• Another example from Nottingham (Researchers)

• What do you think?

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Lets start with a video…

The Academy of Irving, Texas

Relationships – employer/HEI/student

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Challenge space

“The relationship between universities and

colleges, students and employers is crucial to

ensuring that students experience the higher

education they want while studying and leave

their course equipped to embark on a rewarding

career”(HE White Paper, Students at the Heart of

the System, BIS, 2011, p45).

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Relationship

What are professional skills?

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University of Kent www.kent.ac.uk/careers

What else?

• Awareness of the employment marketplace

• Understanding of the sector

• Pathways and module choice

• Work/employment opportunities

• Different types of employers (SMEs/Social

Enterprise/self employment etc.)

• Changing work patterns

• Connecting gaps, action planning

• Feedback from employers 11/20/2012 Event Name and Venue 7

Opportunities to learn about work – how

can students be supported in joining the

dots?

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• Synthesising Career learning and the Course?

• “What are my options?”

• “How do I want to make a living?”

• Skills recognition and showcasing skills

• How can relationships between

student/employer/university be improved to

support this?

Supporting students to find (out about)

work • Access to placements, internships, work

experience

• Access to employers? Milk round? SMEs,

microbusinesses, social enterprises, 3rd sector?

Self employment?

“More than half of graduates are interested in jobs

that will 'make a difference', despite increasing

difficulty in finding work” Article in the Guardian

22nd August 2012 http://www.guardian.co.uk/money/2012/aug/22/graduates-principles-tough-jobs-market?newsfeed=true

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What do employers want?

What do students want?

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How can these be reconciled with mutual

benefit to improve employability learning

for students?

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Central place to find placements

Access to employer lists, tagged and

searchable by sector and organisational

information

Previous placements information

Careers fairs with wider range of employers

Up to date links to the company application

procedures. Up to date links to the company

application procedures.

Information about company project opportunities

Students Employers

Filtered based on interest

A ‘front door’ to the University

Access to research and innovation headlines,

University events

Find student skills for projects

More university engagement with social media

for easier personal networking and identifying

key contacts

Knowledge transfer and research partnerships

From recent interviews (SHED Project 2012)

How can learners be motivated?

“Employability can be enhanced through personal

development planning, but success will depend

upon the extent to which students see a ‘pay-off’

for the effort that they put in.” (Embedding

employability into the curriculum, HEA) http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/assets/documents/employability/id460_embedding_em

ployability_into_the_curriculum_338.pdf

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Course and career learning as well as the practicalities of

finding placements, internships and work do not exist in

isolation.

Construction Foundation Degree, Derby

College “For Derby College, SHED saw the first use of Mahara within the College and in

particular, enabled the College to innovate in their management of student’s

professional learning, using it as a platform for peer development, career

reflection and learning from employer input.

Students gather information that is related to employer requirements and from that

learn how their knowledge appears for an employer. This is not only learning for

them, but for their peers and the College in understanding what sort of

information is of interest to their employer contacts and how students should be

advised to fine tune their employability information to improve their career

prospects. “

For students, the ‘pay off’ may constitute short term interaction with employers for

seeking work or work-experience which also provides real-world learning about

the sectors they are interested in.”

SHED Project Report www.nottingham.ac.uk/eportfolio/shed/documents 11/20/2012 Event Name and Venue 13

Using ePortfolio processes for:-

• Personal Development Planning (PDP) alongside

practical employability concerns for students.

• ‘Marketing’ for students to match their skills to

employer interest

• Communication and networking for career

learning

• Differentiation in the job market

Self-motivation 11/20/2012 Event Name and Venue 14

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“We come to University and

assume that employability is

getting the degree but are

starting to learn that it’s the

degree plus other stuff”

(student participant in SHED

project workshop)

“Students would be

motivated to use their e-

Portfolio if they could have

it when they leave to help

them find a job” (Student,

Nottingham)

“(ePortfolios) a tool for marketing

to differentiate ourselves to

employers” (Construction students

at Derby College)

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Happisburgh 2012 Kirstie Coolin

Interlude…

Example 1: Placement learning in

Nottingham

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School of Biosciences

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Placement journey

Before

Researching employers and sectors,

application, letters, support

During

Recording skills/ relation of placement to

course, journal, feedback

(staff/employers), communication, support

and encouragement

After

Reflection, showcase, resume, career

information

Student-centred e-Portfolio: Placement lifecycle information and activity in one place

Careers/employability learning embedded throughout the lifecycle

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Support and information pages

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Student placement page. She has also created a page about the social side of student

life with other interns in the company.

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Placement page – about – used to communication with learning community about

placement and research

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During placement – weekly reports shared with supervisor, placements coordinator and

in some cases, employer

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Threaded feedback on student ‘placement ‘page’

Example 2: Doctoral Training Programme (BBSRC)

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Analysing Research competences

• “The Researcher Development Framework

(RDF) is a major new approach to researcher

development, to enhance our capacity to build

the UK workforce, develop world-class

researchers and build our research base.”

(Vitae 2010)”

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Using e-Portfolio to:

• Integrate core researcher skill development into

the self-directed/professional development aims

of the programme – Analysis and action planning

• Placement journal

• Student-centred supervisor groups

• Plus - technical developments to pull in relevant

University training courses linked to RDF

competences for dynamic presentation into

student portfolios according to their self-

assessed skills gaps. 11/20/2012 Event Name and Venue 27

• <screen shots – student page, supervisor group

etc.>

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Example of student DTP page. We are seeking feedback from students on their

suggestions for analysing and reflecting on their skills needs

A U D I T

Courses

Research

Student searches employer profiles

Student opts-in, ‘releasing’ contact information and showcase

d

i

s

c

o

v

e

r

y

Institutional

Resource

Student

Events

Equipment

Expertise

Placements

Evidence,

skills,

showcase

RAISE AWARENESS – EASIER ACCESS

CRM

ePortfolio

Employers

Employer

profile

student profile

Details, sector,

projects

Institution employer network

Employer searches student profiles

Professional Learning: • About employment market

• Employment sectors • What employers are interested in • How to organise and present their

skills • Finding placement or work

opportunities • Learning to network (and integrate

other social tools)

Business engagement: • More reasons to engage • Easier to find University

resources • Access to students for work

experience • Wider range of employers

(e.g. 3rd

sector, social

enterprise, SME)

Kirstie Coolin, CIePD, University of Nottingham September 2012

Personal

Administration

Careers and work

Learning + teaching

Over to you...

• How can students and employers be motivated to

use new tools for employability?

• Where do student, employer and institutional

requirements meet, and what would this look like in

terms of processes and tools?

• How can existing institutional learning technology be

used to promote student-led

professional/employability learning?

• How can students be encouraged to reflect on their

personal development autonomously?

• How can relationships between student

/employer/university be nurtured to support this?

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Relevant CIePD Projects

Sharing HE Data (SHED)

ESCAPES (..)

Ingenuity KnowledgeHub

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Thank you

Kirstie.Coolin @ nottingham.ac.uk

@kirstie_c

University of Nottingham

www.nottingham.ac.uk/eportfolio

Designed by Gideon Coolin