pulisball

27 May 2011 11:57AM

Ferst. I as got a PhD innit. Giz a job.

Ealish

27 May 2011 12:13PM

What type of skills do employability schemes concentrate on?

ElizaAnyangwe

27 May 2011 12:22PM

@Ealish
Thanks for your question.
Our panelists don't actually come online till 1pm so I can hope you can join the debate then. Otherwise, will make sure they answer your question and you can check back on the network later to see the archived chat or the 'best bits' summary.

Eliza

marmot99

27 May 2011 12:22PM

One could make a good case that university's are there to educate - i.e., to open minds, to teach critical thinking skills, to show people how to sift evidence to reach decisions - not to act as KPMG training centres. If employers want people trained a specific way then they're welcome to pay for that; universities aren't there to provide employers with free training centres.

ElizaAnyangwe

27 May 2011 12:26PM

@marmot99

That's a very interesting point and I think the panel (and others) will have a lot to say to it. Hope you can stay online and offer any counter points when the live chat starts at 1.

Thanks, Eliza

alopes

27 May 2011 12:26PM

Only reason so many are going to university is because of the lack of any real entry level jobs that have career progression. It's a ridiculous arms race where everyone is getting a degree just to keep up with job requirements and (un)surprisingly, now employers need another factor to discriminate candidates upon.

I'm coming to the end of my undergrad course and it's just a ridiculous situation. First, there's the ridiculous inequality between jobs offered at 2:1 and 2:2 level, a few lost marks on an exam can literally mean a lifetime of difference. It's clearly not even about "academic ability", employers just can't be arsed to sift through the amount of CVs. Is it right that someone with a 2:1 in a light subject like Geography will jump through hoops quicker than someone with a 2:2 in Law? Further to this, why do employers use UCAS points to select candidates? A-Level students aren't told that the points they get will be affecting their chances of getting a job later on in life, they've got enough pressure trying to get the grades for University so it adds insult to injury when they get told 3 years down the line that University didn't help them out.

I guess my question to the panel is why aren't universities doing more to push employers to stop these ridiculous inequalities? Employers are really just stealing the enjoyment of learning from University life by placing this emphasis on skills building and being ahead of the pack.

chrisashby13

27 May 2011 12:46PM

@alopes: you honestly think law is a more rigorous academic subject than geography?

nhjhe

27 May 2011 12:46PM

Afternoon all!

It's been a bit of a hectic week as BSI has hosted our international ISO COPOLCO event which helped celebrate 60 years of consumer interest in standards (http://is.gd/BSIConsumers), so having an afternoon engaging in a debate like this is going to be bliss!

@marmot99 there is a very strong case for that, however I think the 'education for education's sake' argument actually does more harm than good with regards to public perception; it makes it look like students are going on a holiday to delay entering the workplace (which isn't true in most cases at all) 'Education for education's sake' actually has huge employability benefits as it means the student is going to be engaged and-most importantly-gain transferable skills like critical analysis which I think are vital in the modern knowledge economy. I hope this debate today will not just focus on what is education, but focus also on what is employability. My main question to ask is have some employers got it wrong in their assessment of what makes a graduate employable?

@alopes - I can't comment on inequalities from any perspective other than personal experience. As a 2:2 graduate myself I can understand the frustration. Lots of avenues were closed to me because of my 2:2 and I wasn't informed this would be the case (like I wasn't informed of a lot of things when I studied 10 years ago).

alopes

27 May 2011 12:54PM

@chrisashby13 : While I can't provide empirical evidence as to my comment, anecdotally, Geography students from my University and others will always comment about the lightweight nature of their degree.

@nhjhe : I'm currently somewhere between the two classifications and won't know how it ends until I finish my finals. It's hard not to make the comment sound bitter to everyone else though. It's just a complete injustice that employers will right off your degree as being valueless, despite the 3 years of hard effort you've put into it.

pschoenborn

27 May 2011 12:56PM

@nhjhe education should cater for both; maybe the general public needs to be re-educated rather than just focussing on employability. Educating the nation, whether it is for employability or not, will ultimately benefit everybody. If a 60 year old decides to study at HE level, surely this will impact positively all those around her?

CBall

27 May 2011 1:00PM

Afternoon everyone

Just an observation for alopes - geography isn't a light subject and has enjoyed a rather easier ride through the recession than many more lauded ones as a good geography course provides an excellent mix of qualitative and quantitative skills - and employers recognise this.

I'm a 2:2 graduate (from an earlier age), so I do recognise the frustration of people with 2:2s. But the fact is that most 2:2 graduates do actually get jobs - it doesn't actually condemn you to a life of poor employment prospects. A 2:2 will make it hard for graduates with some employers, and this is rather more arbitary than I think any of us would like.

sgedye

27 May 2011 1:01PM

alopes says “I guess my question to the panel is why aren't universities doing more to push employers to stop these ridiculous inequalities? Employers are really just stealing the enjoyment of learning from University life by placing this emphasis on skills building and being ahead of the pack.”

I am not sure if universities can realistically do anything to influence the recruitment practices of employers. However, it is sad to hear you comment on the stealing of enjoyment from learning through the emphasis on skills building.

As an Educational Developer I work with academic staff to make changes to their curriculum and teaching with respect to employability. Some of the best employability teaching is that which develops subject knowledge in problem-base or real-world settings. It is rich in developing student’s understandings of their subject but is skills rich too. On the whole, students like this kind of learning because it is relevant and collaborative.

ElizaAnyangwe

27 May 2011 1:03PM

Welcome everyone to this week's Guardian Higher Education Network live chat on graduate employability.

Glad to already see lots of keen debate. Hope you can stay with our panelists till 4pm.

2 quick points: Terry Jones will be joining us at 2pm and to find out what else is coming up on the network, please become a member of the network.

I think a great first question is from @Ealish:

What type of skills do employability schemes concentrate on?

To that, I'd like to add: could you please give us some context:
Why is employability something that academia should be concerned with?

Thanks, Eliza

PaulBrightside

27 May 2011 1:04PM

Hi - I work for Brightside - an education charity which runs a number of online mentoring schemes including Ask @ BCU - where Birmingham City University students are taught employability skills by alumni and mentors from industry and various professions. What role do you see for mentoring when it comes to teaching employability skills?

sgedye

27 May 2011 1:05PM

Depends on the context but high ranking employability skills/attributes include

Working under pressure;
Oral communication skills;
Accuracy, attention to detail;
Working in a team;
Time management;
Adaptability; Initiative;
Working independently;
Taking responsibility and decisions;
Planning, coordinating and organizing
Negotiation

lroper

27 May 2011 1:06PM

Why does this panel not include any 'regular' academics, but only 'entrepreneurs', 'career management' staff, and the like? Of course, graduates need employment, but surely higher education's remit does not entirely coincide with that of the job centre?

AnnaTayler

27 May 2011 1:06PM

@alopes. You make some good very good points about academic credentials.

Wednesday of this week I watched a presentation from PriceWaterHouseCoopers who historically are very academically lead when recruiting students. But more and more employers are realising that they could be missing out on excellent candidates, so much so PWC have come up with a scheme called 'Inspired Talent' <a href="http://www.pwc.com/uk/en/careers/student/inspired-talent.jhtml">http://www.pwc.com/uk/en/careers/student/inspired-talent.jhtml where people who haven't got the right grades but have still achieved things i.e. started own business, achieved high standard of sport, can still apply.

More and more employers are also lowering their Degree qualification requirements to a 2:2 to ensure that they don't miss out on potentially excellent candidates as not everyones University experience goes to plan. The big thing they look for is the golden one 'work experience' .

Catch22

27 May 2011 1:07PM

@alopes

While I can't provide empirical evidence as to my comment, anecdotally, Geography students from my University and others will always comment about the lightweight nature of their degree.

Not making sweeping generalisations about something from a few anecdotal points made about one degree at one university is probably something employers might appreciate.

davidsurtees

27 May 2011 1:08PM

afternoon everyone
@alopes I understand the issue of gradings and selection is high on everyone's mind but my expereince of empoyers is that they say they use these as guidelines and if a candidate can display quaities and comptences in other ways they are more than happy to progress applications. The difficulty lies in demonstrating these qualities in what are restrictive recruiement environmments.

PaulBrightside

27 May 2011 1:09PM

To what level can these skills be taught? Do you think we need a recognised employability skills qualification as the CBI suggest?

CreativeET

27 May 2011 1:09PM

@ alopes

"Only reason so many are going to university is because of the lack of any real entry level jobs that have career progression."

I'm afraid this is exactly the kind of mis-conception which means graduates struggle to find work.

The truth is that every entry level job is a springboard to career progression, this is because you are 4x more attractive to another employer when you're in work than when you're not. This includes work placements/volunteering too.

The reality is that it is rarely the person who is best qualified, experienced, suitable, etc. who gets the job; it is the person who knew the most about how to get hired.

This, along with fundamental employability knowledge (career ladder, responding to feedback, self esteem, taking responsibility, assertiveness, etc.) should be taught in schools, nevermind universities!

alopes

27 May 2011 1:10PM

Thanks for the replies so far by the way. I also want to clarify that I'm not speaking specifically just from negative personal experience, just commenting on what I've seen from job requirements.

Everything I've become involved in outside of my academic life has been purely for personal enjoyment and to make friends; there is a distinct dislike for those that become involved in these pursuits for career gain, "CV Hunters" as they're branded. The idea of there being skills which I could "sell" to employers is generally an afterthought. As I touched on earlier, higher education is becoming more and more of an arms race, who can rack up the most internships, who can get the most committee positions and it's frankly ridiculous. It's common practise amongst students to get involved in activities, sit on the sidelines and then "bullshit" it to employers about what they've done.

CBall

27 May 2011 1:10PM

@PaulBrightside

We have people with us who mentor and they describe it as being a massively positive experience (declaration: I don't do it yet as I have a young family and can't commit enough time to be fair to a mentee).
There is so much about the sheer brass tacks of getting a job and the experience of working in it that can be articulated very well by an enthusiastic person who is actually practising what they preach, and it can work very well.

The other point to make is that the data shows that personal, family, professional contacts - networking, in other words (the subject of the next webchat!) - is the most common way for a graduate to find their first job and on purely pragmatic terms, being mentored and building a good relationship with that mentor can be a big benefit, not just in terms of first steps on a career ladder but in work in general.

The difficulty, of course, is finding enough people who can mentor effectively. I would like to but can't at the moment, for example.

AngelaMaher

27 May 2011 1:13PM

Hello - I am a little late signing in but I just wanted to add a general comment looking at the discussion so far. If one looks into the research on employability you will find that it is an inherent part of the process of education (not training) - good employability is synonymous with good learning. Employability is not about detracting from any other aspect of learning or knowledge/intellectual development. I think we have long since moved on from the debate of education for education's sake. On the issue of entry requirments for cetain professions - I am sure employers will have something to say about that - but I do feel there are often arbitrary standards set by employers that do not relate to any ability to actually do the job being advertised.

AnnaTayler

27 May 2011 1:13PM

@CreativeET, I absoulutely agree with you on:

This, along with fundamental employability knowledge (career ladder, responding to feedback, self esteem, taking responsibility, assertiveness, etc.) should be taught in schools, nevermind universities

!

At University of Salford we developed a programme called 'Graduate Gateway' which developed all the things you suggested i.e transferable skills, clever job finding, mock interviews etc and the followed it up with a 12 week placement in a company- the training combined with the placement lead to very successful outcomes with many students being kept on by that company.

CBall

27 May 2011 1:13PM

On the subject of employability skills, our annual publication, 'What Do Graduates Do?', has an article written by a careers adviser (the redoubtable Janet Willis at Manchester) on what employers look for, which gives a rundown of employability skills and how to acquire and demonstrate them.

pschoenborn

27 May 2011 1:14PM

Getting students involved with employers throughout their education seems to be one of the most effective things to do, placements, case studies/authentic assessments provided by employers, work based learning opportunities etc.

davidsurtees

27 May 2011 1:14PM

@paulbrigthside. My opinion is that a separate qualification is not the way forward, I consider that employability skills are common in developing 'graduate attributes' and have much wider applications than in the workplace.

CreativeET

27 May 2011 1:17PM

@AnnaTayler

Great to hear that Anna. I coach/train people right across the workless sector and know from experience that it's the 'inner game' to finding work that is an area completely unknown to most people.

I'd love to hear more about 'Graduate Gateway' - please mail me:
chrishall@creativeevolutiontraining.co.uk

sgedye

27 May 2011 1:18PM

@PaulBrightside Personally I think mentoring is a very important part of the mix. My own experience of being a lecturer was that students often wouldn't pay as much attention to the messages I was giving them as they would an outsider. Having a mentor sharing their skills, specialist knowledge and contacts and providing an interest and encouragement is known to be very valuable.

I am aware of successful examples of this from my own institution, the University of Plymouth. For example a children’s book collaboration ‘We Love Looe”. This was a chance for postgraduates students to write/illustrate and typeset a children’s book, in collaboration with professional mentors. http://www.plymouth.ac.uk/pages/view.asp?page=30309

I would like to see more use of mentoring but of course, this needs employers to show willing to!

alixgreen

27 May 2011 1:18PM

I agree with @nhjhe that the 'education for education's sake' argument raises some issues with public perception. The uni as a holiday idea is one, another is that is carries an undertone of protectionism i.e. that universities are in defensive mode rather than engaging constructively and openly with the imperatives of the outside world. This is often not the case and universities are indeed receptive to these kind of dialogues - admittedly some more than others - but it's vital to get language, tone and emphasis right...

I also don't see any issue with universities being much clearer in their articulation of their contribution to the public good. I'm not sure we/they have been that successful in putting forward the case for HE in public and political debate. Talk of "valleys of death" doesn't help anyone, least of all universities.

I also don't see any issue with connecting employability with public good. It's all very well decrying HE as KPMG training (an easy corporate target) but what about SMEs, or charities, or schools and hospitals etc? Employment isn't a dirty word, a lower activity somehow than study - can we not emphasise the common practices between the two rather than setting up a dualistic impasse between the two? i.e. think about what we do when we study and when we work rather than get hung up on what they mean? I would think that there must be many common practices in terms of application, investigation, analysis, presentation, persuasion, negotiation etc.

PaulBrightside

27 May 2011 1:19PM

@CBall

Yes - from our experience the mentors gain as much as the mentees when it comes to developing communication skills etc. It's also essential to train them effectively to give out the right information in the right context. For all the students here - who do you most trust when it comes to getting employability skills info? The uni? Careers services? Friends and family?

nhjhe

27 May 2011 1:21PM

@paulbrightside I'm not sure a separate qualification would actually resolve any of the issues that exist.

I agree completely with Angela that employability in inherent in education. A lot of the skills I have found useful in my career have come not through the subject I studied, but the education process itself. I think there is a difficulty in getting people to understand just how important that is.

AnnaTayler

27 May 2011 1:24PM

@alixgreen, as with many media topics somethings I feel get out carried away and if you look at Universities in detail I think many are engaging with their community and contributing to the public good. An example from Salford University is a scheme called USCATS (University of Salford Community Action Teams) who are developing volunteering projects that see students (and staff!)gain invaluable real-life experience and practical skills to make them stand out of the crowd on both application and interview.

With times being as difficult as they are, more and more people are turning to volunteering which both aids and contributes to public good and community as well as students development

PaulBrightside

27 May 2011 1:24PM

@ sgedye

How would you convince employers? Emphasising that it's mutually beneficial as I mnetioned above - incorporating it into their own staff training / CSR objectives - as well as emphasising that they'll be connecting directly with enthusiastic students with a definite interest in their company / sector. It's a 2 way thing

alixgreen

27 May 2011 1:25PM

@nhjhe spot on - if we can think about the process of education I think we'll find it maps well onto processes in work...

AnnaTayler

27 May 2011 1:25PM

@CBall Would you say that mentors may have a greater impact for people who might have come to university with lower social capital in terms of contacts and networks?

nhjhe

27 May 2011 1:26PM

@sgedye

I hear a lot of SME employers dispute the worth of mentorships and internships, yet when I ask them why it seems it's because they don't understand the potential value of these schemes. Would you say that universities need to reach out to SMEs and-in some ways-teach a sceptical audience the value of HE and these schemes?

jpringle90

27 May 2011 1:29PM

To further add to the employability aspect of academia, I have just completed my undergraduate degree and alongside this I have taken part in the LJMU world of work certificate scheme. Although I have gained certain skills in various areas of my subject, my degree provided me with very few practical skills, and limited opportunity for a placement to gain work experience. I hoped to obtain some sort of clinical placement as part of a module this year, however the organisation was very poor and I received so little help in obtaining a placement that following months of phone calls, letters and emails, I was simply allocated a placement in something I have very little interest in, and no intention of following on into a career - I was effectively typing out an extra assignment alongside all the other assignments I had going on...as if I hadn't spent enough time in front of a computer. Anyway, the point I would like to make is that universities should try to create more links with employers and offer more opportunities for placements throughout the duration of the course. With regards to the world of work scheme, I was sceptical about the benefits of the programme, however it has made me realise the general skills I have picked up through part-time employment, sports, and university without actually realising, and these are the skills that are questioned during interviews; I realised this last week in an interview for a temporary post. This should hopefully hold me in good stead when I begin my search for a 'proper' job!

davidsurtees

27 May 2011 1:29PM

@AnnaTayler, I agree that volunteering is a good way to develop valued skills but at Edinburgh Napier our students tell us they have difficulty in finding time away from study family and part time work to devote to volunteering. A sign of the times maybe?

PaulBrightside

27 May 2011 1:30PM

@AnnaTayler - the majority of our schemes directly address students from lower socioeconomic groups and that's where we have the most impact. If you don't actually know anyone who's been through higher education personally then the sheer amount of information out there is overwhelming and often confusing and contradictory. Clarity of message and co-ordination between employers and universities is crucial I think - rather than just having employers snipe 'you're just not giving us graduates with the skills we need'

alixgreen

27 May 2011 1:31PM

@AnnaTayler I don't doubt there are many, many examples of universities engaging with their communities. My own institution, Hertfordshire, has a strong record in this respect. But how well do we as a sector synthesise these into a persuasive case and contribute that case into an open and constructive debate? I wonder if we've left the floor to the politicians and the media? They are key participants, but we need to be there too - and definitely not in defensive mode

holzy

27 May 2011 1:32PM

At the risk of being instantly erased, I'm afraid I think you lot are a bad thing for HE. I have no problem with pro-active in-house employment services for students, but I absolutely resent having to design modules that prioritise so-called 'employment transferable skills' - prioritised over academic content (this at a Russell Group uni).

Claiming that education for the sake of education is somehow a redundant argument reflects a general lack of understanding of the value of education and I note you don't back this up with any evidence.

So how do you defend yourselves from the claim that you simply want to convert HE into training for work?

I will add that I meet plenty of young people who have left university without completing their degrees - a typical example:

At my local supermarket there's a lad behind working the checkout who quit uni two years into an art history degree. The reason: his parents had decided his degree wasn't geared to future employability so told him that if he didn't quit they wouldn't welcome him back home during vacations...

AnnaTayler

27 May 2011 1:34PM

@jpringle90- good luck with the interviews!

With regards to Universities building more contacts with employers, in my experience dedicated employer engagement staff will be doing this. However, a lot of jobs aren't advertised and your enthusiasm and interest in a job is just as likely to find work than advertised posts. You are your best marketing weapon!

If you can attend networking events in your area of interest and meet the people who make the difference, with proper preparation i.e. CV, research, appropriate dress can make a massive impact. Not only this, the use of social media i.e. twitter and linked in to find contacts in your area and sending a speculative cover letter, cv and a bit of persistence i.e. follow up calls can also be very effective.

sgedye

27 May 2011 1:34PM

I would like to pick up on what @AngelaMaher says about employability being synonymous with good learning. Courses that benefit student employability are ones where employability is central to design and delivery – not just bolt on. Students see straight through this.

A curriculum designed for employability will relate well to other key areas of provision (e.g. sustainability or internationalization). It will promote and develop students research skills and use problem-based approaches (which develop skills such as team work and the ability to deal with uncertainty). In these ways employability will not be seen as an add-on and will provide opportunities to think about the whole curriculum and pedagogies in HE to the benefit of wider educational aspirations (as well as career ones).

pschoenborn

27 May 2011 1:35PM

@AngelaMaher @alixgreen
Angela says we have moved on from that debate, but have we really? With the renewed emphasis on measuring impact, there is a lot of focus on employability data. How can we measure (and make available to potential students and the wider public) effective learning and the usefulness of an HE education (at a particular HEI) which does not lead to a career?

JCIVES

27 May 2011 1:35PM

Hello, I am glad to have the opportunity to join this interesting debate.

Going back to the initial question about what are employers seeking in new graduates, over and above a degree- we asked many employers from large and small organisations to define this - the responses were all very similar and can be described as greater self awareness, including emotional intelligence, more understanding of the organisations graduates want to work in and how these operate as well as demonstrating skills that will help them organise and manage their work in a professional way.

It seems to me that it is about graduates understanding more about themselves and their own unique set of skills and ablilites, some of these will come from their degree programmes but many may be developed in activities undertaken outside the curriculum, part time jobs, sports activities etc employers are interested in the person they are employing.

nhjhe

27 May 2011 1:35PM

@paulbrightside

Clarity of message and co-ordination between employers and universities is crucial I think - rather than just having employers snipe 'you're just not giving us graduates with the skills we need'

This is an attitude, coming from an employers perspective that annoys me greatly! Some employers are very happy to state HE isn't doing a good enough job, but cannot articulate why and offer ideas to collaborate on. At BSI I'm trying to look at how we can get standardisation taught as a concept which would be interesting to both students and academics and the only way I feel this can be done is working together and actually listening to what the sector would like us to do to try and make that happen.

CBall

27 May 2011 1:37PM

@Anna,

That's a very strong argument. It is difficult to overestimate the effects of social capital and the Sutton Trust, in particular, are extremely strong on research into the effects. HECSU is also heavily involved in examining how social capital can affect employability through the Futuretrack research we fund.

Mentoring can help people who lack contacts (or the confidence, sometimes - after all, not everyone can turn up blind to a company they barely know and ask for work experience) and can help them build up networks.

@PaulBrightside

I should have mentioned that our mentors report that it is very positive for them. HECSU is, by any standards an SME and we encourage staff to act as mentors because as well as feeling that mentoring is a good thing in general and something we want to encourage, it is a very positive contribution towards personal development. SMEs also need to be mindful that if they are in a particular sector, that any young person interested in that sector is not just a potential employee, they're a potential client, supplier or business partner.

PaulBrightside

27 May 2011 1:39PM

@holzy
I don't think the two are mutually exclusive though - a lot of skills you develop in academia - research etc. - can also be applied to the workplace. It's how to make both students and employers realise this