Hi again, everyone.
I’m feeling a little odd about having to admit, for the 175th time, that I let my blog space go silent. I’m going to make a stronger effort to post more frequently here–this effort is inspired by a new path I’ve just begun to follow. I’ve just started a Career Development certification course and it is really engaging to be digging deeply into the “career” end of my career advising praxis. My hope is that the journey down this path will also fuel a great deal more productivity here… guess we’ll see.
So, here goes…
I happened across an interesting article the other day while looking for sources to cite. It highlighted an interesting dichotomy that I’ve seen a number of times. Here’s the link–my “two cents” follows:
https://ncda.org/aws/NCDA/pt/sd/news_article/228998/_PARENT/CC_layout_details/false
This was a meaningful read to me, despite the fact that it seemed more focused on the intersection of higher education and workforce development in Canada. It brings up all the typical “hot button” issues when thinking about this topic from a US Higher Ed perspective; “education vs. job training,” “is this an educational experience or a chance for employers to use ‘free labor’?”
This quote struck me:
“As Professionals, we need to help students translate these experiences into learning about their values, skill development, career exploration, and the application of course-based learning into practice.”
This is something that has regularly challenged me when advising on resume/cover letter writing. How do we help a student quantify and qualify the tasks they undertook in the co-op/internship into the language that educators will understand in assessing each student’s acquired competencies? How do we help students communicate their experiences in general terms and as broad-based competencies that future employers can understand as meaningful? The link out to the Laurier University site and their “Experience Record” was a really fun distraction—it took all my energy to not go down the rabbit hole of reading every page on the Laurier Web site 😉
If the above quote struck me as meaningful, this one took me back a bit. The quote below was a bullet point in a list that was questioning the barriers that are unwittingly created:
“GPA requirements: Eligibility for experiential learning opportunities is often determined by grade point average. This can exclude large numbers of students, including those who might benefit the most in terms of labor market outcomes.”
Citing GPA eligibility as an undue barrier flies in the face of the fact that all experiences in higher education need to be educationally relevant in order for them to be meaningful from an academic success perspective. “Food for thought,” to be sure.
OK, that’s all I’ve got for now–more to come and watch this space…
Major Discoveries 