1. Engaging with students and employers at virtual events
Association of Graduate Careers Advisory Services
Careers Information and Employer Liaison Conference: Networks and Networking
Engaging with students and employers at virtual events

2. Virtual Careers Fair – The experience at Bournemouth University
Charlotte Haynes
Graduate Employment Officer
Bournemouth University

3. Context
Approximately students across 6 academic schools; (Business and Law, Media, Design, Engineering and Computing, Conservation Sciences, Services Management and Health and Social Care).
One main campus where the majority of students are based and a smaller campus 2 miles away where Health and Social Care and Postgraduate Business School students are based.
The majority of students that attend our events are already at the campus where events are held.

4. Event Background
One main Careers and Placements Fair and a programme of skills workshops, recruitment days and presentations that run during the autumn term.
October 2009 Careers and Placements Fair October – a two day event with different exhibitors on each day.
October 2009 Virtual Careers Fair 28 – 30 October.
2009 The first year we ran a Virtual Careers Fair.
Used the Prospects Virtual Fair Product.
Virtual Fair offered free of charge to all of the 90 companies that exhibited on either day of the Careers and Placements Fair.

5. Why did we have a Virtual Fair?
Offered virtual fairs by a number of providers.
Decided to trial a virtual fair as many other institutions were offering them to their students.
We wanted to see if a virtual fair would be popular with our students and the employers we work with.
It was less costly than running a ‘real fair’.

6. Overview of our Careers Fair week
Our Careers and Placements Fair was very popular; 90 exhibitors and over 3500 students attended the event over the two days.
Employer and student feedback from the ‘real’ fair was very positive – possibly our best event so far!
The Virtual Fair was not popular with employers or students.
We struggled to get employers to sign up to the Virtual Fair and students told us they would rather attend event in person and speak to employers face to face.
We only managed to arrange one employer-student chat – employers just weren’t interested!

7. The Software and our ‘User Experience’
Purchased and used the Prospects product.
Required a lot of communication back and forth with Prospects to get the product to work the way we wanted it to.
Staff required a substantial amount of training to use the product and many still found it confusing!
System was slow and sometimes broke down.
Staff spent a lot of time answering questions from employers who were also confused how to use it.
Not as user friendly as it could be.

8. Employer Opinions & Comments
‘We’re coming to your fair so we’ll see students there – we don’t need to attend a virtual fair as well.’
‘We prefer to see students face to face.’
‘We haven’t the time and resources to set up a virtual fair account and have someone available for a chat.’
‘We’ve found virtual fairs a waste of time in the past so we aren’t keen to participate.’
‘Our company information is online and in your online fair guide so we don’t think there is a need to have a stand at the virtual fair as well.’

9. Employer User Experience
Time consuming to set up yet another account – the autumn term is a very busy time!
Users were mainly HR staff not IT staff and often found the system complicated to use.
General feeling that the system was not particularly user friendly or easy to navigate.

10. Students Opinions and Comments
‘I prefer to meet employers face to face and ask questions to them directly.’
‘I’ve already been to the fair and I don’t have time to look at a virtual one.’
‘There are hardly any employers exhibiting at the Virtual Fair – it isn’t worth taking part.’
‘The ‘real’ fair has a great buzz and you get freebies; the atmosphere isn’t the same at a virtual event.’
‘It’s time consuming to set up yet another account at the university – I’ve already got loads.’

11. Student User Experience
BU students aren’t used to the Graduate Employment Service providing an online or virtual service – they have to come into the service for appointments and to book events so the Virtual Fair was completely new to them.
Didn’t seem to feel that the event added any value to what they were already eligible for from our service.
General feeling that the system was not particularly user friendly or easy to navigate.

12. So why wasn’t it successful
Main Factors
We only run one Careers and Placements Fair which our students do attend and is very popular.
The majority of BU students are on one main campus and therefore don’t have problems attending ‘real’ events.
The software we used to run the event didn’t turn out to be as user friendly as we hoped – staff, employers and students all reported problems.
Employer time constraints
Virtual Fair Event Timing?

13. What next?
Very glad we’ve tried it but its not something that’s suitable for BU at the moment.
Decided to concentrate on ‘real’ careers events rather than virtual ones. Hopefully we will be able to run more careers events on campus during
We may consider a Virtual Fair again in the future but only if there is a lot of interest from both students and employers. We will also spend more time evaluating the different products on the market.

14. Virtual Career Events - the Ulster experience Seamus McConomy Work Experience Development Officer

15. Connecting Ulster students
Excellence through Work Experience
6 Faculties across 4 campuses
The largest course provision on the island of Ireland
14,500 full-time undergraduate students
Over 48% of undergraduate Graduates get recognition from the University for Work-Based Learning.
14500 undergraduates, add 1200 postgraduate research and taught students, then overseas and part-time and then distance learning brings the total to over clients.

16. Career Development Centre on-campus events
Careers & Placement Fairs: October on 3 campuses
Construction Placement Fair: November on 1 Campus.
Nursing Fair: April on 1 campus
Northern Ireland Graduate Recruitment Fair: June on 1 campus
Employers on campus: lectures, trade stalls, forums
Work Experience Week: February across all 4 campuses.

17. Aim for Virtual non-campus event
Co-ordinate a connection with all students on all campuses
Trial new approaches to raising profile of work experience
Take account of students who would not be on campus on one particular day
Use technology to deliver services
Present flexible options for resource- and time-poor work experience providers

18. Recommendation from non-campus event 2009
3-day virtual event is still a 3-day activity; expect resource demand over 3 days.
Appropriate management information for evidence of service delivery to all students on all campuses.
Positive and negative anecdotal feedback from work experience providers during the initiative.
Limit chat facilities to guaranteed engagement.
Incorporate a Fair at the Jordanstown Campus blended with a Virtual Work Experience Fair accessible by registered Ulster students.

19. Recommendation from blended event 2010
A series of small information / engagement days across all campuses suits institutional need
Overarching virtual presentation of fair on Career Development Centre web (2.0 framework):
Student and Exhibitor registration
Interactive Advice provided by Career Development Advisers
Searchable vacancy listings (local, national and international)
Application and interview link to UlsterGradNAV
Personal Development System CV builder link
Registrant feedback and reporting

20. Ulster experience
Planning and Promotion in the virtual arena is important
Low student engagement with a virtual event can be as frustrating as at an actual event.
Collect management information:
exactly who attended (exhibitors and students)
how many hits on the website, at what time?
archive transcripts from chat events / interactive advice
standardised feedback from participants
A blended approach offers alternatives to a greater amount of students.

21. Ulster experience 2008- 2010 contd
Manage the technology in-house – don’t expect employers to register themselves or undergo training
Maximise use of existing online resource which is familiar
Our opportunity to try something completely new is now passed – building current practice.
Continue to search for a suitable “suite” of products and services which collectively deliver blended connection.

22. Connecting students and employers online – The OU experience
AGCAS CIEL Conference 2010
Wendy Woolery
Open University Careers Advisory Service

23. So how can we connect students to employers in a different way?
The issues for the OU
The differences
The similarities
The challenge of working with employers as a distance learning university
So how can we connect students to employers in a different way?

24. Our solution: Online forums
How do they work?
The technology used
Access to the forums
Benefits to students and employers
So what did we do and how did we do it?

25. First Steps ‘What Employers Want’ forum in 2008
Which employers we used
How it worked
Statistics
Feedback from students and employers

26. Follow up ‘Public Sector Employers’ forum in 2009
Which employers we used
How it worked
Statistics
Feedback from students and employers

27. Conclusions and way forward
Overall conclusions and what we learned from doing the forums
What we plan to do with forums in 2010/11
Other ways to use technology to engage employers and OU students in the future

29. Wendy Woolery – w.woolery@open.ac.uk
Any questions?
Wendy Woolery –

30. Engaging with students and employers at virtual events
Association of Graduate Careers Advisory Services
Careers Information and Employer Liaison Conference: Networks and Networking
Engaging with students and employers at virtual events