Hi all,

Just a random question. It's not my area, so I was just wondering why lecturers would question, or oppose, the idea of employability? I've never looked into this but I'm just interested, as I don't quite understand why academics would be against improving the employability skills of students? I know this is probably incredibly naive, but like I said I've never looked into this, so any insight would be great!

I think its because degrees shouldn't necessarily be mills where students get pushed out as worker bees - they are to advance your knowledge (well originally).

I think that there just needs to be a whole new classification and a lot more vocational stuff for people who want to get away from home etc. but don't want to be writing essays and doing 'traditional' subjects.

I really don't feel learning should be ALL about employment prospects. I understand many people go to uni for better prospects, but I don't think that link should be encouraged. Going to uni should change a person's job prospects only because it has changed them as a person. If they look at the world with a more open, analytical and critical mind, on top of all the subject specific learning, then finding employment should follow. The current media attention on the question "what is the point of a degree if it isn't useful" (and, of course, they have their own ideas as to what qualifies for the term 'useful') boils my blood.

My first degree (English language) focused two entire compulsory modules on employability and it was a total waste of my time. This also boiled my blood. We were encouraged to think about 'transferable skills' and perform arbitrary SWOT analyses and personality tests. We completed essays on how English is a 'blue-chip' subject, in terms of all the useful stuff we learned that could be applied to the work place. And this useful stuff, by the way, wasn't critical thinking, research skills, the ability to consider more than one argument in a balanced manner etc (y'know, the stuff uni education is renowned for); it was team-work, presentation skills, working independently etc (y'know, the stuff you could just as easily learn at McDonalds - in fact, employers might consider that work history evidences these skills more so than uni).

Students should be told about employability... but it should begin something like this: "It's extremely difficult to find employment of any sort and will be for a while, and competition is very high because there are so many graduates. It is likely that your degree won't be enough to impress prospective employers..." At which point the students should be advised about the benefits of getting a part-time job, volunteer work, extra-curricular activities etc. Then they should get back to what uni is all about: education, not training.

That I was forced to sit through these lala land classes about the supposed benefits of a degree, only to witness so many of my uni friends completely unable to find any job at all as graduates infuriated me. They were deceived when they should have been warned. And in no class was it ever mentioned that the real purpose and benefit of a degree had nothing to do with income.

Sorry for the lengthy rant- my lecturers were (ostensibly at least) very much in favour of teaching about employability, and I feel it did much more harm than good.

Because the purpose of university is education, not subsidising private companies' training costs. This is a point that a lot of this post-Thatcherite society fails to grasp; for supporters of this dominant creed the only thing that is worthwhile is that which can be measured in monetary terms and on an individual level.

Talking of Uni in terms of how much more money an individual with a degree makes, as the media often does as it justifies hiking tution fees, is yet another case of people knowing the cost of everything and the value of nothing.

haha my mum's favourite phrase, my daily mail reading mother in law (:-s) calls her a 'loony left wing guardian reader', the same mother in law that cannot understand why hubs and I did PhDs and then want to work in academia and public sector rather than work 'in the city' and earn as much as possible. (its because we want a life lol and we already have a flat screen tv which was hubby's chief ambition in life :p )

I think that education for education's sake and the joy of knowledge is sadly not a driving force in the world today. I wish that personally I could learn for the noble reasons that universities were initially set up but that's never been a luxury that I've been able to indulge in. I can't afford to not look to a good job (hopefully) at the end. Its always been a juggling act as to what the next step would open up for me in terms of employability (having said that the PhD is a step too far lol) but I do agree that unis give students a false idea of the levels of employability their degree will offer them. I think its a great shame that the world is like this now, but then that is the reality when university education is opened up to the working and middle classes. In the good old days when only the rich could enter job prospects at the end wasn't really a priority in the same way that it is today so education alters (or so my sup told me lol). Having said that the way things are now, although not as pure as it once was means that countless thousands of us have had the opportunity to discover new things, learn, improve our minds, develop passions but I know for me there is always that carrot at the end which I sincerely wish didn't have to be there. People have asked me if I won the lottery would there be any point continuing - errr HELLO!!!! That would be amazing, to be able to do this without that constant nagging worry about employability and job prospects at the end..... I have a friend who did her PhD in her 60s just for the pleasure and challenge of learning - heck I envy her!

I am genuinely shocked! I thought almost everyone thought increasing awareness of transferable skills etc was a good thing.

I think it's an excellent thing!!! At the end of the day, tuition fees are heavily subsidised so they should be helping increase someone's job prospects. I really don't see why that's incompatible with increasing knowledge. In fact, I think without it we as academics risk alienating ourselves and going back to the heady days of ivory towers. Why can't you research X Y and Z as well as learning about how to impress the people with the cash and jobs (who may well fund your post doc, fellowship etc)???

I for one didn't do my PhD in some noble quest for knowledge. I did it because I thought the project advertised was important and interesting but mostly because I wanted to be a career researcher. I've now changed my mind and am going to be working in the NHS and without advice on how to enhance my CV from the careers department I'm pretty positive I wouldn't have the job which I'm due to start in October.

I agree Stressed, it's not the driving force in the world today. However, we are not all the same and it is a driving force for many; particularly those in HE who went through the sacrifice of doing a PhD (on top of a Masters, Degree, A-Levels, GCSEs.) Furthermore, it's important to fight for the way in which the higher education system is viewed. If we let people continue to think that the purpose of University is to churn out people ideal for graduate jobs then that is what University will become; and that's when, as is already happening, fields of knowledge are judged "worthy" or not on the basis of how economically productive they are......hence all this talk of STEM and ringfencing money. It's all the legacy of Thatcher and her evil ways.

A116: It's not so much that increasing someone's job prospects is a bad thing, particularly in the current climate. However, it is very much a question of degree and procedure. I doubt many academics would disagree with the existence of a Careers Department and the potential to help people who request help, but if the idea is to make it integral to courses then I doubt many would agree. Furthermore, the continued push by the CBI, media and government don't seem to be going for increasing awareness of transferable skills but for the teaching of more skills.

I hear what you're saying and all universities should have a good careers dept where students can voluntarily go to for information and advice, and that dept should be full of people who are very knowledgeable on the subject of employability/transferable skills/prospects/opportunities. But lecturers (who are usually experts in a different field altogether) should stick to teaching what they know best without any concern for what it is the economy currently needs. There's no reason that a degree should have employability built into it in the same way mine did. Knowing about transferable skills isn't the same as having them, and far from being useful, the modules actually deceived us about our own employability & the importance employers place on transferable skills.

Stressed, I too went to uni for better job prospects. In fact, I arrogantly applied with the sole aim of obtaining a degree which would show employers how smart I am, without even considering that I would learn anything. Thankfully, I got more much from uni than I bargained for, but yes, getting a career at the end is important to me too. But I don't think my lecturers should've been concerned with directly improving my career prospects; their only concern should be increasing knowledge. Now we're moving into a time when people are arguing that degrees have no point unless they are directly relevant to a particular job. But university isn't there to cater to the current job market, and to train people for the jobs out there. Education doesn't have to become training to be useful.

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I did my A Level Psychology so I could do my B.Sc, so I could do my PhD so I could work in the area. So every step of the way when ever transferable skills and employability have been mentioned I've been bored to death. I enjoy the area I'm in and want to work in it, I don't want to transfer elsewhere!

What confuses me most is how many students do a degree but aren't interested in the area or aren't interested in a career in that area. Our of all the people in my circle of friends who went to Uni only two of us, including me, are in an area related to out degree. Though there's one other person with a tenuous link. And very few showed a real interest in just the area. No learning for learnings sake that I could see. Lots of people seem to have gone to Uni because it's something to do, because it's expected or because they think they'll get a job out of it. When really they'd have been better off either getting a job straight off or waiting until they know what they want to do.

All the news about students struggling to get to Uni makes me pretty sad. Because there'll be a fair few people desperate to do a course because they're interested in it, because they've always dreamed of it or because it's the first step in the career they want, who can't get in because of how oversubscribed it all is. It makes me worry about my younger brothers, one who'll be attempt to go to Uni as a mature student next year on a course he really wants to do, and my youngest who knows exactly the area he wants to work in, and study later on.

I think I've strayed from the point :) I don't think it's the job of a lecturer to improve employability skills unless they teach a module on it! They should teach their area, and use their expertise. If any of it can be applied elsewhere and be used as a general skill then great but it should be up to the student's and career services to do the rest. The whole point of a degree should be to learn about an area, not to learn general job skills.

For me this all links into the 'impact' debate of research. I'm in a VERY applied area and as researchers we are very much encourged to do research that will impact the industry - that's fine. But now we have consultants who work in the industry saying to academics that we need to not only research, but also then tell the consultants what our research means for them and how they should apply our findings. And for a while lots of academics have been desparately trying to do this. But now there has started to be a core of people saying "hang on a minute, as consultants, its THEIR job to 'translate' our academic research into something they can use", or at least a bit of give and take, not just us doing everything and them cashing in :-s

Anyhow, I quite agree, if you want a degree to be training for a job, then call it something else i.e, the KPMG training programme.

The impact of research worries me a little, especially when it's linked to funding. A lot of research is about building a paradigm or pushing it closer to an eventual shift. A lot of work won't have an impact until it's gathered moment, which could take years. And then by that point the funding will have been choked off :( I'm not a massive fan of the impact requirements for research assesement.

Consultants should pull their own weight! They get paid enough.

There definately should be courses aimed solely for job skills. In fact they should already be in place at school/college level. Maybe instead of General Studies A Level's they should have a Career Skills one. From what I remember about general studies I got taught some basic spanish, which was below the standard of GCSE I'd gotten in it previously. I got taught 'essay skills' which oddly enough were being honed in the psychology and history A levels I had, on a weekly basis. Same with critical thinking and debating. The only part of it I enjoyed was when I nearly got thrown out for debating the teacher over the opinion she expressed (as fact) in the debate lessons!

There wasn't really much going on career development wise. I had meetings with people here and there which basically boiled down to them telling me I should expect X grades and be able to get in Y universities.