This document discusses embedding employability in university curriculums. It defines employability and provides examples of how the Computer Science department at the University of Manchester embeds it in different levels, from separate initiatives to being fully baked into the curriculum. The benefits are outlined as students securing placements and the university gaining industry partnerships. Costs are one dedicated academic and administrator. Comparisons are made between higher and secondary education approaches to employability.

1. Embedding employability
in the curriculum
Dr. Duncan Hull
http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~hulld

2. Academic & PS staff
Curriculum
Students
Employability

3. Peter Green’s Embedding rank
0. Separate
1. Sprinkled on top
2. Mixed in
3. Baked in

4. Learning outcomes
• Discuss what employability is
• Describe where employability fits in the curriculum
• Provide some examples from Computer Science
• Compare and contrast higher & secondary education
• Rank & benchmark employability in your Department / Team
• Discuss costs and benefits of employability to the University (and
Higher Education)

5. Employability = intersection(s) of hard, soft & $$

6. Where does employability fit?
• Examples from Computer Science

7. • Close collaboration & partnerships
• Employers
• Students
• Academic staff
• PS staff
• Careers service staff
653 students on placement
since 2012
http://www.cs.man.ac.uk/~hulld/employers.html

8. Compare Employability in education
“Higher” education
“Lower” (?) education (Primary, secondary & further)
Subject
Knowledge
Pedagogy

11. What can we learn from Shaftesbury School?
• Not all of Shaftesbury is like the Hovis advert
• Low social mobility
• Low geographical mobility (also in big cities too, not just rural phenomenon)
• Rural poverty
• Lack of aspiration
• CRUCIAL role of careers advice (and careers advisors)
• Crucial role of peers, family, teachers
• “social capital” (not what you know but who you know)
• Vertical tutoring

12. ted.com/talks/sir_ken_robinson_changing_education_paradigms

14. www.cs.man.ac.uk/~hulld/vertical-tutoring.html

15. Benchmarking and evaluation
• Benchmarking helps us evaluate what we are doing
• Much more detailed & practical than DLHE & Graduate outcomes (because
OFSTED)
• Goes beyond “best practice” to identify weaknesses (as well as strengths)
using simple checklists

16. goodcareerguidance.org.uk

17. Benchmark examples
• “The employability programme should be regularly evaluated with
feedback from students, (parents), academic staff and employers as part of
the evaluation process.”
• “A school’s careers programme should actively seek to challenge
stereotypical thinking and raise aspirations”
• “Every pupil should have opportunities for guidance interviews …
whenever significant study or career choices are being made … timed to
meet their individual needs”
• “Every school should have a stable, structured careers programme that has
the explicit backing of the senior management team, and has an identified
and appropriately trained person responsible for it.”
goodcareerguidance.org.uk/the-benchmarks

18. Where does employability fit?
How is employability assessed?
• Year 1, 2, 3 & 4
• Some Compulsory lots of optional
• Formative feedback
• Summative feedback
• Some is Credit bearing (between 10 and 30 credits)

19. Embedded Level Zero examples: Separate
• Debug your CV (Duncan and Mabel)
• Appointments with careers advisors / careers service events
• Competitions and hackathons studenthack.com
• Monday Mail / Wednesday Waggle
• Careers fairs: Kilburn building, Drop-Ins, MyFutureFest, Armitage
Centre, Big Careers fair in Manchester Central
• One-off lectures from distinguished alumni

21. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Big_Tech

22. Embedded Level 1 examples: Dumped on top
• COMP101 guest lectures from industry club
• COMP101: Written communication and CVs
• Managing my Future
• Second year tutorials (CV check)
• Kilburn internships (~15 per year) & other spring insights, summer
internships

23. Embedded level 2 examples: mixed in
• Stellify, Manchester Leadership programme (MLP), Leadership in
Action (LIA)
• PASS2 (not so much PASS1)

24. Embedded level 3 examples: baked in
• COMP101: Teamwork, build a thing, any thing!
• COMP233: Second year software engineering
• COMP300: Propose your own project
• supervisors.cs.man.ac.uk
• Coding Their Future (working in schools)
• www.cs.man.ac.uk/~hulld/coding-their-future.html
• Year long placements, degrees “…with industrial experience”
• MEng summer internships
• COMPJUDGE for algorithms marking.cs.manchester.ac.uk

25. Costs
• Running since at least 1997! Professor Roger Hubbold (archive.org),
Linda Brackenbury, Alex Walker
• https://web.archive.org/web/19970514093933/http://www.cs.man.a
c.uk/aig/staff/roger/placements/placements.html
• One 100 FTE academic member of academic staff (me)
• One full time PS staff (Mabel Yau)

26. Benefits
• In 2019 our students have secured year long placements at Accenture,
Agilent Technologies, Amazon (2), AND Digital, Apadmi (5), Arggo, ARM (5),
Autodesk, AVL Powertrain, BAML, the BBC (2), Biorelate, BJSS, Bloomberg
(2), BMW Mini, Bsquare Controls (2), BT, Cantarus (3), Celtra, CERN (3),
Codethink, d3t, Elysian Systems, Feral Interactive (2), Fidelity, FiveAI,
HMRC, IBM (2), Imagination Technologies, Intel (4), ISA Software (2), JP
Morgan (4), Keysight Technologies, KPMG (1), Matillion (4), McAfee (2),
Mentor Graphics (4), Monoprix, Morgan Stanley (2), NCC Group, Nokia,
Nomura, Novacoast (2), Ocado (3), PA Consulting, PwC, Schlumberger,
ServiceNow, Siemens (3), Soda Software, SteamaCo, The Hut Group (10),
The Start Up Factory (2), Uber, Visa and Vodafone.
www.cs.man.ac.uk/~hulld/employers.html
• Win, win, win situation (employers, students & University)
• Network feeds back

27. Manchester jobs
git.io/manc
• Lots of great jobs are
not in London #NotJustLondon

28. Learning outcomes
• Discussed what employability is
• Described where employability fits in the curriculum
• Provide some examples from Computer Science
• Compared and contrasted higher & secondary education
• Benchmark employability in your Department / Team
• Discussed costs and benefits of employability to the University

29. Acknowledgements / References
• Sharon Dale (2018) #NotJustLondon Creative commons licensed picture
medium.com/21st-century-mindset/notjustlondon-whats-that-then-
a2c5822eadc9
• Sir John Holman (2014) Good career guidance, Gatsby Charitable Foundation
gatsby.org.uk/uploads/education/reports/pdf/gatsby-sir-john-holman-good-
career-guidance-2014.pdf
• Ridley Scott (1974) Hovis Advert google.com/search?q=hovis+advert and
goldhillshaftesbury.co.uk
• Professor Peter Green (EEE@UoM) linkedin.com/in/peter-green-7a1aa011/ (for
Green’s embedding rank with apologies to students (who are definitely NOT like
pets!)
• Roger Hubbold, Alex Walker, Linda Brackenbury, Mabel Yau, ACSO & SSO in
Computer Science