English Subject Centre

ONLINE CAREERS MAGAZINE PROJECT

Stephanie Darking

BrunelUniversity

June 2007

Enhancing Careers Services to English Students

It is a widespread view that English graduates are not good at ‘selling’ themselves to employers. This is not to say that they lack the skills, attributes and enthusiasm that employers seek: research conducted by the English Subject Centre shows that English graduates are doing as well as, if not better than, most other graduates three to four years after graduation.

Employers value the skills in critical thinking, communication and analysis that English graduates usually possess, but our students tend to underestimate the relevance of these skills to the workplace. (The ‘student profiles’ project undertaken by the Subject Centre produced a template which helps students link the skills listed in the English Benchmark Statement to those typically sought by employers.) English students need assistance and encouragement in articulating, in a way that is interesting and relevant to employers, the skills and attributes they have developed whilst studying and engaging in extra-curricular activity.

For this reason, the English Subject Centre has sponsored small projects in Careers Services which tailor materials or events specifically to the needs of English students. About ten projects were undertaken, covering such activities as interview technique workshops, alumni presentations, web-based resources and careers open-days. Details of all the projects can be found on our website at: . This document is a report on one of these projects.

The English Subject Centre

Royal Holloway, University of London

Egham, Surrey TW20 OEX

T. 01784 443221

Online Careers Magazine Project – BrunelUniversity

Background

The project aimed to develop greater awareness of careers issues amongst English students through facilitating an online careers magazine produced by English students and graduates.

Planning

The plan was to recruit an Editorial Panel in September/October; select, edit and format content; publish online at the start of the year and seek feedback and evaluation starting from March onwards. This timescale proved to be over-ambitious, mainly because I had underestimated the pressure of work in an exceptionally busy autumn term and had also underestimated the amount of time the project would require. Response to the initial publicity was slow; it took some time to generate enough interest to build on, consequently the Editorial Panel, which was the cornerstone of the whole programme, was not in place until January 2007. This meant that the evaluation of the completed careers magazine did not take place as planned.

Marketing and publicity included posters, direct emails, lecture shouts and information sent out through lecturers. The Panel generated valuable additional interest and contributions by word of mouth and personal contacts in strategic courses. An alumni database and some on-going contacts amongst English graduates yielded some excellent case study type material.The panel met for two hours weekly from January to the end of term and the online Eng-Zine was completed by the end of March.

The technical support in putting the Eng-zine and its website together was given on a voluntary basis which had its disadvantages in terms of not being able to demand a tight completion date but which freed up funds to enable the production of a print version of the magazine.This was not in the original bid but it became apparent quite early on that it would be desirable to have print copies not just for the contributors’ portfolios but which could also be used for marketing the Careers Service to English students in future years.

The web-based format was deliberately kept simple to allow for future development of the online version.

Resource Allocation:

Vouchers for contributors

Design and printing of paper version

Technical support

Memory sticks

Benefits

  • I have seen more English students than normal as a result of higher profile of Careers Service and more frequent contact with students
  • Careers Service has higher profile in the academic department
  • Very satisfying to have a specific project for English students & hope it will lead to increased “buy-in” to the idea of developing employability from Year 1 amongst future undergraduates
  • A good platform for future activities with academic departments
  • A great project for the Editorial Panel to have been involved in. Their commitment and enthusiasm has been inspirational.

Problems

We would have liked more articles to have been submitted – clearly the timing is important and possibly there would have been a higher level of response if we had managed to keep to the original timescale.

Finding enough time to work on the project was challenging and I ended up doing a lot of the work at weekends.

Defining the identity/style of the magazine and getting the wording right for our publicity campaign was a harder task than anticipated.

The Future

If there is enough interest amongst students this could be an on-going project which could result in a continuation of the existing Eng-Zine, or a new edition each term/year.

The next challenge is to generate enough publicity to ensure a substantial readership; and to add in monitoring and evaluation mechanisms.

Where to find it

Currently the URL for the online version is:

I will email a PDF of the print version upon request.

Stephanie Darking

BrunelUniversity

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