1. Dr. Blánaid White School of Chemical Sciences 27th April 2017
Eportfolios for INTRA placement – a pilot study in the Schools of Biotechnology and Chemicals Sciences, DCU
Dr. Blánaid White
School of Chemical Sciences
27th April 2017

2. Eportfolios for work placement students
“eportfolio is a showcase of their knowledge and technical skills and can be used to demonstrate their suitability for a job description”
Why start with INTRA for eportfolios?
Currently ideally all students will complete an INTRA placement, so it’s a good way to introduce the concept to them,
As a pass/fail module, it’s a “safe” module to introduce a new idea within,
Currently INTRA reports generated by students are static, and not seen by most students as useful going forward – they are submitted to the INTRA office and then forgotten about,
All staff engage with the INTRA module, so it will introduce staff too.
There is an opportunity for students to recognise all the skills they’ve learned in INTRA and incorporate them in their skill-set going forward

3. Eportfolios for INTRA – the rollout
During INTRA, students complete at least 6 diary entries and submit these to their supervisor via loop. They will tag these entries with key skills and DCU graduate attributes.
At the end of INTRA, students will use the diary entries to write their INTRA report, which they will also submit via loop.
Students in fourth year, when they meet with Careers Office, will be directed to use their diary entries to build their unique skills profile (T-shaped graduate)

4. Learning diary entries
6 diary entries spaced evenly throughout placement (INtegrated TRAining - INTRA)
Topics for learning diary entries:
A time when you had to negotiate personnel issues, e.g., changing your holiday dates
Your first day on the INTRA job
Having to deal with a difficult person or situation
Being expected to undertake a completely new area of knowledge or a complex task
Receiving either positive or negative feedback from a superior
Realising that you have made a mistake
Finding yourself with nothing to do
Your best day on INTRA
Diary entry tags:
Graduate Skills & Attributes: Attention to Detail, Attitude, Design thinking, Flexibility, Initiative and Creativity, Interpersonal Skills and Teamwork, Judgement, Knowledge of the company, Leadership Potential, Organisational Adaptation, Problem Solving, Quality of work, Technical Ability, Time management, Verbal communication, Written communications  
Technical Depth: Regulation, including GMP, HPLC, Excel, Technical Competence, Programming, Analytical Skills, Report Writing, Data Analysis, Organic Chemistry

5. Final report – pulling everything together
1 Introduction
2 Company structure
3 Duties performed
4 Knowledge gained
5 Theory -v- practice
6 Ethical Considerations
7 Self- Evaluation of Performance
8 Self-development Plan
In the light of everything you have written in your reflective journal, outline a plan for your future development during your final year in college. This plan should identify the skills you need to acquire and how you will do so. The plan should also consider some of your career options in the light of your INTRA experience. It should, in addition, cover the ways in which you will manage your time while in final year, including the balance between work, college and social activities. This shows that you meet Learning Outcome 8 “Apply the knowledge gained from the host workplace to other aspects of their scientific programme”.
9 Conclusions
Learning diary entries are used to inform all sections of this report