Embedding employability into the curriculum: five recommendations to improve widening participation students’ graduate employability
DOI:
https://doi.org/10.47408/jldhe.vi26.925Keywords:
employability, diversity and inclusion, equality, graduate outcomes, widening participationAbstract
Ensuring students succeed during and beyond their degree, no matter their background, ethnicity, disability or demographic has been outlined in the mission of the English higher education regulator, the Office for Students (Office for Students, 2018). Additionally, there are endless strategies, agendas, research projects and discussions around improving Equality, Diversity and Inclusion (EDI) within universities, yet there is less literature relating to EDI activity relating to graduate employability. This paper argues that the areas where greater attention is required within EDI is the work of academics and careers support services, to enhance graduate outcomes, through the development of core employment and recruitment skills (Underwood, 2022), through embedding professional literacies into the curriculum. From making parallels with strategies to support academic literacies, this paper argues that certain employability development elements should be embedded into the core assessed curriculum of degrees, to support all students in developing their professional literacies.
References
Ahmed, A. K. (2020) ‘#RhodesMustFall: how a decolonial student movement in the global South inspired epistemic disobedience at the University of Oxford’, African Studies Review, 63(2), pp.281-303.
Association for Learning Developers in Higher Education (2022) What is learning development? Available at: https://bit.ly/3xxZakm (Accessed: 18 August 2022).
Bracken, S. and Novak, K. (eds.) (2019) Transforming higher education through universal design for learning: an international perspective. London: Routledge.
Bradley, A. (2021) ‘Putting the employ into employability’, Wonkhe, 22 June. Available at: https://wonkhe.com/blogs/putting-the-employ-into-employability/ (Accessed: 18 August 2022).
Bradley, A., Priego-Hernández, J. and Quigley, M. (2022) ‘Evaluating the efficacy of embedding employability into a second-year undergraduate module’, Studies in Higher Education, pp.1-13. https://doi.org/10.1080/03075079.2021.2020748.
Daubney, K. (2021) ‘Teaching employability is not my job!: redefining embedded employability from within the higher education curriculum’, Higher Education, Skills and Work-Based Learning, 12(1), pp.92-106. https://doi.org/10.1108/HESWBL-07-2020-0165.
Dunne, J. (2017) ‘Working placement reflective assessments and employability enhanced through highlighting graduate attributes’, Journal of Teaching and Learning for Graduate Employability, 8(1), pp.40-59. https://doi.org/10.21153/jtlge2017vol8no1art616.
Frankham, J. (2017) ‘Employability and higher education: the follies of the “Productivity Challenge” in the Teaching Excellence Framework’, Journal of Education Policy, 32(5), pp.628-641. https://doi.org/10.1080/02680939.2016.1268271 .
Hall, M., McCullouch, J. and Lawrence, K. (2022) ‘Service children in education: a review of the literature from five countries’, Widening Participation and Lifelong Learning, 24(1), pp.53-85. https://doi.org/10.5456/wpll.24.1.53 .
Higher Education Policy Institute [HEPI] and Unite (2017) Reality check: a report on university applicants’ attitudes and perceptions. Available at: https://www.hepi.ac.uk/wp-content/uploads/2017/07/Reality-Check-Report-Online1.pdf (Accessed: 23 January 2023).
Higher Education Statistics Agency (2022) HE Graduate Outcomes Data. Available at: https://www.hesa.ac.uk/data-and-analysis/graduates (Accessed: 18 August 2022).
Hirudayaraj, M. (2011) ‘First-generation students in higher education: issues of employability in a knowledge-based economy’, Online Journal for Workforce Education and Development, 5(3), p.2.
Islam, M., Lowe, T. and Jones, G. (2018) ‘A “satisfied settling”? Investigating a sense of belonging for Muslim students in a UK small-medium Higher Education Institution’, Student Engagement in Higher Education Journal, 2(2), pp.79-104.
Lea, J. (2015) Enhancing learning and teaching in higher education: engaging with the dimensions of practice. New York: McGraw-Hill Education.
Lea, M. R. (2004) ‘Academic literacies: a pedagogy for course design’, Studies in Higher Education, 29(6), pp.739-756. https://doi.org/10.1080/0307507042000287230.
Lowe, T. (2020) ‘An evaluation of a translation intervention to raise awareness of employability skills gained from higher education’, Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education, Issue 18, October, pp.1-26. https://doi.org/10.47408/jldhe.vi18.576.
Moore, J., Sanders, J. and Higham, L. (2013) Literature review of research into widening participation to higher education. Report to HEFCE and OFFA. AimHigher Research & Consultancy Network. Available at: https://www.offa.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2013/08/Literature-review-of-research-into-WP-to-HE.pdf (Accessed: 23 January 2023).
Morreira, S., Luckett, K., Kumalo, S. H. and Ramgotra, M. (2020) ‘Confronting the complexities of decolonising curricula and pedagogy in higher education’, Third World Thematics: A TWQ Journal, 5(1-2), pp.1-18. https://doi.org/10.1080/23802014.2020.1798278 .
Office for Students (2018) Securing student success: regulatory framework for higher education in England. Available at: https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/publications/securing-student-success-regulatory-framework-for-higher-education-in-england/ (Accessed: 8 December 2022).
Office for Students (2022a) Condition B3: baselines for student outcomes indicators. Available at: https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/media/490d884f-03aa-49cf-907d-011149309983/condition_b3_baselines.pdf (Accessed: 18 August 2022).
Office for Students (2022b) Access and participation plans. Available at: https://www.officeforstudents.org.uk/advice-and-guidance/promoting-equal-opportunities/access-and-participation-plans/ (Accessed: 18 August 2022).
Rodríguez, M. A. T., González-Monteagudo, J. and Padilla-Carmona, T. (2021) ‘Employability and inclusion of non-traditional university students: limitations and challenges’, IAFOR Journal of Education, 9(1), pp.133-151.
Ross, F. M., Tatam, J. C., Hughes, A. L., Beacock, O. P. and McDuff, N. (2018) ‘The great unspoken shame of UK higher education: addressing inequalities of attainment’, African Journal of Business Ethics, 12(1). https://doi.org/10.15249/12-1-172.
Saunders, M. (2022) ‘We’re doing engagement on careers and employability all wrong’, Wonkhe, 9 June. Available at: https://wonkhe.com/blogs/were-doing-engagement-on-careers-and-employability-all-wrong/ (Accessed: 18 August 2022).
Trinity College, University of Cambridge (2021) ‘New access initiative for Year 10 black students’, 18 January. Available at: https://www.trin.cam.ac.uk/news/new-access-initiative-for-year-10-black-students/ (Accessed: 18 August 2022).
UCAS (2021) Where next? What influences the choices school leavers make? Available at: https://www.ucas.com/file/435551/download?token=VUdIDVFh (Accessed: 18 August 2022).
Underwood, J. (2022) ‘Assessment can have a big impact on graduate employability’, Wonkhe, 17 February. Available at: https://wonkhe.com/blogs/assessment-can-have-a-big-impact-on-graduate-employability/ (Accessed: 18 August 2022).
Universities United Kingdom [UUK] (2017) Education, consumer rights and maintaining trust: what students want from their university. Available at: https://dera.ioe.ac.uk//29420/ (Accessed: 23 January 2023).
University of Manchester Students’ Union (2022) What is Reclaim the Night? Available at: https://umsu.unioncloud.org/reclaimthenight (Accessed: 15 November 2022).
University of Worcester (2022) Support for autistic students: the disability and dyslexia service. Available at: https://www.worcester.ac.uk/about/news/academic-blog/support-for-autistic-students-the-disability-and-dyslexia-service.aspx (Accessed: 18 August 2022).
Downloads
Published
How to Cite
Issue
Section
License
Copyright (c) 2023 Journal of Learning Development in Higher Education
This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International License.
Authors who publish with this journal agree to the following terms:- Authors retain copyright and grant the journal right of first publication with the work simultaneously licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution License that allows others to share the work with an acknowledgement of the work's authorship and initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are able to enter into separate, additional contractual arrangements for the non-exclusive distribution of the journal's published version of the work (e.g., post it to an institutional repository or publish it in a book), with an acknowledgement of its initial publication in this journal.
- Authors are permitted and encouraged to post their work online (e.g., in institutional repositories or on their website) prior to and during the submission process, as it can lead to productive exchanges, as well as earlier and greater citation of published work (See The Effect of Open Access).
