1. Peter Knight, The Open University, UK Enhancing employability through pedagogic practices

2. Bologna  See handout #1 for summary.  “The degree awarded after the first cycle shall also be relevant to the European labour market as an appropriate level of qualification. ” (Bologna)  Lifelong learning (Prague)  Quality assurance?

3. Overview  Employability: a discourse  Responses  Co-curricular  Curricular  Actions  Being strategic

4. Employability is the hook … … for talking about, advancing and researching:  The quality of the student experience.  Good learning.  Valued academic practices. On the basis of international research evidence.

5. Employers talking  Employer satisfaction with new graduate hires:  Complain of specific failings — no general HE programme could anticipate them. Handout #2

6. The ESECT view A set of achievements, understandings and personal attributes that make individuals more likely to gain employment and be successful in their chosen occupations.  Consistent with thinking in other countries — Hong Kong (Ed Ko), Australia (Simon Barrie), Canada (Alan Wright), USA (Marcia Mentkowski).  Has attracted attention at European conferences.

7. Complex outcomes of learning  Advanced (but ≠ formal operational thinking).  Slow (10000, 5000, xxxx hours).  Fuzzy (precision only at the expense of validity). See the modern version of Bloom’s taxonomy, handout #3.

8.  Employability: a discourse  Responses  Co-curricular  Curricular  Actions  Being strategic

9. Co-curricular responses (1)  Co-curriculum  All those arrangements made outside the ‘regular’ curriculum for the educational enrichment of the undergraduate years  Careers provision  Student Union activity  Includes all other special certification of skills, out- of-class work (e.g. graduate enterprise), voluntary work, optional work experience/placement, and …

10. Co-curricular responses (2)  ‘Add-ons’ have significant but limited power.  The predicament of careers services.  The ‘co-curriculum’ and unequal access.  Slow growing achievements.  Fails to capitalise on what subject areas can contribute if well taught.

11.  Employability: a discourse  Responses  Co-curricular  Curricular  Actions  Being strategic

12. Curriculum responses (1)  Employability lies less in curriculum content than in curriculum processes.  An entitlement approach to learning, teaching and assessment.  A programmic approach to employability, learning, teaching and assessment.

13. Curriculum responses (2)  The LTSN/GC Learning and Employability series (2004).  Yorke, M. (2004) Employability in Higher Education: what it is and what it is not. York: the Learning and Teaching Support Network.  Yorke, M and Knight, P. T. (2004b) Embedding Employability into the Curriculum. York: the Learning and Teaching Support Network.

14.  Employability: a discourse  Responses  Co-curricular  Curricular  Actions  Being strategic

15. Action #1  Offer an alternative to the ‘toxic waste’ view of employability.

16. Action #2  Refresh web sites, module handbooks, programme guides, open day materials, programme specification, etc.

17. Action #3  Awareness  For staff: creating a learning culture.  ‘This is how we do things around here’.  Rules of the assessment game.  Rules of the job-getting game.  For students: knowing what you know.  Self-awareness.  Claims-making.  CV building.

18. Action #4  Look at teaching: do practices support the development of complex outcomes?  Sufficient variety?  Sufficient coherence?

19. Action #5  Look at learning:  Problem-based?  ‘in the wild’?  Encourage autonomy?  Encourage collaboration?  Cumulative?

20. Action #6  Look at assessment  Grading-focused?  Learning-oriented?  with complex outcomes in mind?  Self- and peer-assessment?  Building curricula vitae  e-assessment?

21. Action #7  Audit LTA practices at programme level.  Modular programmes?

22. Action #8  Use tools to help employability audits  www.esect.co.uk. www.esect.co.uk

23. Action #9  Tune and tighten the programme.

24. Action #10  Work with student unions/associations  Course reps and curriculum

25. Action #11  Careers advice and guidance …  … and curriculum.

26. Action #12  Research and knowledge transfer: develop the evidence base

27. Action #13  Professional bodies

28.  Employability: a discourse  Responses  Co-curricular  Curricular  Actions  Being strategic

29. Pascarella and Terenzini (2005)  College can affect students. Key elements include:  Diversity  Engagement  Quality of the whole experience (in and out of class).  Challenges to  Course-based approaches.  Default ‘instructional’ patterns.  ‘Bedrock cultures’.

30. From tactics to strategy?

31. More readings  Barnett, R. and Coate, K. (2005) Engaging the Curriculum in Higher Education. Maidenhead: Society for Research into Higher Education and the Open University Press.  Knight, P. T. and Yorke, M. (2004) Learning, Curriculum and Employability. London: Routledge/Falmer.  Pascarella, E.T. and Terenzini, P.T. (2005). How college affects students (Vol 2): A third decade of research. San Francisco: Jossey-Bass.  Yorke, M and Knight, P. T. (2004) Employability: judging and communicating achievement. York: the Learning and Teaching Support Network.

32. Contact Peter Knight, Institute of Educational Technology, The Open University, Milton Keynes, MK7 6AA peter.knight@open.ac.uk http://iet.open.ac.uk/pp/peter.knight/