‘Students becoming graduates’ is examining the role of industry-placements for UK Business students in ‘becoming’ successful graduates.
Students’ graduate success is predicated on their ‘becoming’ a graduate and this ‘becoming’ in turn enhances retention, attainment, and wellbeing. Opportunities for students crafting their ‘becoming’ have though declined, as a political desire for ‘employability’ as measured simplistically through the acquisition of subject knowledge and transferable skills, has replaced the loftier purposes of higher education to prepare students for a future societal contribution.
Industry-placements offer opportunities for students to explore their future identities and to develop a graduate sense-of-self. Yet uptake of industry-placements is declining and is particularly low for those from socially disadvantaged and minority backgrounds (HESA, 2021). Students’ ‘becoming’ successful graduates might thus be risked through little exposure to role models other than academics and limited opportunities for identity development other than as a student. This risks graduates’ outcomes and accentuates attainment gaps.
This study is important for both understanding how we might better support students to develop agency for their future, and for discerning the value of authentic work-based learning environments for supporting students’ more effective transition to graduate work.
The project is based within the Business-Management Schools of Northumbria, Liverpool and Manchester Metropolitan Universities. This multi-site focus will support the greater relevance and application of the findings across the AHE membership.
Collaborative Development Fund 2023-24
Check out the other Collaborative Development Funds projects.
Aims and objectives
The principal aim of this project is to examine the importance of industry placements for supporting Business students’ identity crafting, or ‘becoming’ and specifically within the context of widening participation. The project is located within the Business discipline as while these students typically have strong career ambitions, they notoriously lack a clearly defined career and/or understanding of the careers to which their degree might lead. Three supporting objectives are thus discerned:
- How do Business students understand their university education and the role of industry placements?
- To what extent do industry placements enable Business students to ‘become’ graduates?
- How might industry placements enhance outcomes for widening the participation students within the Business discipline?
Project outputs
Guide
The primary output for this project is a publication which will illustrate the nature of Business students’ becoming in the final year of their university studies. This publication will act as a guide for other HEIs to better understand the value of specific learning environments for supporting students’ becoming and their more effective transition to their graduate work, also providing insights regarding the support given to students to secure a placement, or, significantly, to creating equivalent learning environment/s where such identity crafting can be stimulated. Understanding how to support this necessary ‘becoming’ is vital for enhancing student outcomes among many of our student groups and for rectifying attainment gaps.
Webinars
Webinars will be run with Advance HE to support this publication.
Project team
Kate Black PFHEA
Professor of Management Learning and Education, Northumbria University
Kate holds the role of Head of Education within the Business School and a pan-University strategic leadership role. Her research has shaped awareness that a core principle of education is to enable learners to craft and trial their future professional identities. These understandings underpin her leadership of curriculum development and design in enabling students to craft their professional-selves. Follow Kate on social media at @KateblackKate LinkedIn
Russell Warhurst SFHEA
Associate Professor and Faculty Research Ethics Director, Northumbria University
Russell has published extensively in the area of identity studies, having demonstrated how employability involves a process of becoming, that is a process of identity-work and identity transformation. Russell is particularly accomplished in delivering funded empirical research projects and has developed distinctive research methods for discerning and examining processes of becoming.
Philip Oliver SFHEA
Assistant Professor/Senior Lecturer, Northumbria University and Placement Co-ordinator, Newcastle Business School
As Placement Co-ordinator and having previously had an extensive career in outsourcing and Application Service Provision within a finance software company, Philip has considerable interest in examining how placements add value to students’ university career.
Martyn Bradley SFHEA
Senior Lecturer and Deputy Director of Studies, University of Liverpool Management School’s Business Management programme
With colleagues at the University of Liverpool, Martyn has conducted research concerned with identity work in the legal services industry publishing findings with the Law Society. He has also recently published work concerned with programme-level engagement with Harvard Business Publishing.
Mark Crowder PFHEA
Reader in management education, Manchester Metropolitan University
Mark has more than 20 years of management experience in both the public and private sectors. Mark holds PFHEA and is a Fellow of the CMI and IoL. He is a Certified Business Psychologist and a Certified Management and Business Educator. Mark is the postgraduate lead for the Department of Strategy, Enterprise and Sustainability, and is faculty lead for a range of projects including ‘Developing Education Excellence’. As a facet of these roles, he is interested to understand how taking a year in industry positively influences students’ capabilities and future employability. Mark’s research interests are primarily centred around education and the psychology of decision-making.