Building Student Employability from Day One

A Process Model for Designing Employability Award Programs to Develop Graduate Employability

“…In essence, employability awards are a collection of activities-that students are most likely already engaged in-rather than purposefully designed programs. Some employability award programs require students to complete a minimum number of eligible activities, whereas others encourage students to reflect on their development of skills (Russell & Kay, 2019). It seems that the aim of many employability awards is to increase the range and volume of activities that students do in the hope that this will give them the edge over less proactive students.…”

“…Calls from industry and governments to improve the employability skills of graduates has resulted in universities viewing employability as predominantly concerned with competencies or human capital development (Brown et al, 2022). Accordingly, universities have chosen to enhance graduate employability via the teaching and assessment of graduate attributes (Barrie, 2006;Hammer et al, 2021;Oliver & Jorre de St Jorre, 2018), career development learning Brown, Healy, McCredie, et al, 2019;Lin-Stephens et al, 2019), work integrated learning (Jackson, 2015;McIlveen et al, 2011), and employability award programs (Russell & Kay, 2019;Watson, 2011).…”