Co-authored by Kathy Egea and Rhiannon Hall.
The most recent FFYE Forum, titled ‘Diversity, Careers and Curriculum: supporting student transitions for professional practice’ was full of insights from the community on how we can support students for successful career transition. The session featured presentations from:
- Chiara Allogia (Career Development Manager) and Esita Sogotubu (Employability Manager) from UTS Careers on Career Development Learning (CDL).
- Franziska Trede (Education Portfolio) on the WIL space principles
- Bronwyn O’Brien (Science) and Poppy Watson (Health), who both presented on their 2024 FFYE Grant work
Here are some of the highlights from the session.
Checking in on career transition across equity groups
To start us off thinking about how we can help all students to have a fulfilling university experience and inspire them to live up to their potential, FFYE Coordinator Kathy Egea walked us through some of the graduate data. While there were some signs of improvement (including positive outcomes for Indigenous graduates and regional and remote groups), the work on transition continues to be essential for other groups that fare less well (such as international students, students with disabilities and women in STEM). Thinking in terms of what we can do in our roles to improve the transition experience for students, Kathy reminded us that it’s always important to come back to the six core principles based on Sally Kift’s Transition Pedagogy.
Inclusive careers and career development learning
UTS Careers plays an essential role in helping students make informed decisions to start building their careers while still at university. Esita and Chiara took us through some of the offerings for students, which include:
- The embedding of career education into courses across UTS using CDL– now at 67 courses, 118 subjects and 20,000+ students reached.
- 1:1 appointments for students with Peer Career Advisers or Career Consultants for career coaching.
- Support for co-curricular or targeted career education.
- Workshops on framing equity into CDL
Academics who are interested in assisting their cohorts in career development can contact Careers for tailored assistance to embed their CDL Framework.
In the next part of the session, Franziska Trede introduced the WIL SPACE principles to frame the work of two 2024 FFYE grant recipients on their projects.
The Hidden Curriculum: discovering professional self through GenAI collaboration
Bronwyn O’Brien (Science) shared findings from the work completed as part of her FFYE grant. Her work focuses on a medical science capstone subject, and takes a close look at student relationships with GenAI and connects this to their professional skills development. Both scales move chronologically through the same five states of students connections to GenAI or professional development:
- Unaware
- Tentative
- Engaging
- Strategising
- Empowered
The SPACE principles also play an important part in this process:
- Supported
- Purposeful
- Authentic
- Collaborative
- Evidenced
This work is supported by the Power Bi Student 360 Subject Dashboard, which provides a full and comprehensive view of the cohort. The outcome of the grant is a subject that substantially helps students to construct their career goals, and offers a scalable model for embedding employability and reflective practice across the curriculum.
Broadening first-year undergraduate Psychology students’ outlook and confidence to explore diverse career possibilities
Poppy Watson (Health) took a close look at first-year undergraduate Psychology students’ feelings about careers, identifying that students often have mixed feelings about finishing their training at Master’s level (which is necessary for students who want to progress to clinical psychology practice), and also have trouble connecting their skills to alternate career paths. A suite of videos featuring UTS Psychology graduates discussing their careers was created as a sustainable resource that can be embedded in subjects. Poppy trialled these videos with her students in class and used surveys before and after the students had watched the videos, then performed statistical analysis on the survey results. The resource was shown to improve students’ understanding and confidence of career options and also to reduce the gap between equity cohorts and all other commencing undergraduate students.
Discussions in the breakout rooms
In the breakout rooms, attendees were asked to consider how they inspire their students for life-wide career journey, challenges that diverse cohorts have have in this journey, ways to build capacity and confidence in curriculum and co-curricular domains, and partnerships that may enable this.
Key ideas that arose include:
1. Early and ongoing career engagement
- Start career conversations in first year through industry panels, career modules, and early engagement strategies.
- Embed career development across the whole course, not just in isolated activities.
2. Authentic exposure to career pathways
- Invite industry mentors and alumni to share real-world experiences.
- Use authentic assessments and case studies to connect theory to practice.
- Build partnerships with industry, employers, and alumni networks.
3. Reflection and self-discovery
- Integrate reflective activities into assessments.
- Encourage exploration of personal values, strengths, and interests.
- Help students understand diverse and non-linear career journeys.
4. Inclusive and accessible career development
- Design inclusive curriculum experiences and microsites.
- Address equity challenges such as systemic barriers, cultural expectations, and confidence issues.
- Provide tailored and accessible opportunities for all students.
5. Peer and mentor support
- Use student mentors and peer networks to foster belonging and relational connection.
- Promote diversity and personalised career pathways through supportive communities.
Inspiration for future practice
In a word cloud at the conclusion of the session, participants shared some of their takeaways, highlighting the possibilities for capacity building, inclusion, whole of program mapping and much more.
For more information on FFYE, join the Teams site or contact Kathy Egea [Kathryn.Egea@uts.edu.au].