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Employability Skills of STEM Student Ambassadors

Lead Institution: University of Exeter
Collaborating with: Graphic Science, Plymouth University, University of Bath, Devon Education Business Partnership

Project Outputs > Employability Skills Workshop Resources

Working alongside Devon Education Business Partnership, the universities of Exeter, Plymouth and Bath have developed interactive training materials and a session plan in relation to key employability skills that may be useful for students when entering employment. A local employer forum was engaged in development of these tools to provide key information about the desired employability skills for recent graduates.

The below tools have been used across 4 training sessions, engaging a total of 42 STEM student ambassadors.

Employability Skills Workshop - Session Plan

Employability Skills Activity Cards - Single Attributes

Employability Skills Activity Cards - Grouped Attributes

Employability Skills Workshop - Powerpoint Presentation

Supporting the employability skills workshop are 2 resources (downloadable below). The first is an audit, developed following the engagement of STEM employers by the Devon Education Business Partnership. Employers identified 8 employability skills that they would look for in recent graduates:

  1. Teamwork
  2. Business & Customer Awareness
  3. Problem Solving & Creativity
  4. Communication & Literacy
  5. Application of Numeracy
  6. Application of IT
  7. Positive Attitude
  8. Entrepreneurship

As part of the training session, students are encouraged to reflect on these skills and think about how they might have developed some or all of them through their work as a STEM ambassador. Students are also provided with an example of a Covering Letter - the second resource - so that they understand how best to sell themselves to potential employers.

Employability Skills Workshop Resource - Employability Skills Audit

Employability Skills Workshop Resource - Covering letter

Student Feedback

The training sessions have proved very popular with students, and they have benefitted immensely from them - see the student case studies section for examples as to how. of a full evaluation report of their feedback is below, following some comments from attendees:

"This training was a great opportunity! It really emphasised the need to develop your employability skills in order to be successful in today's job market. Further to this, it provided you with practical ways of doing this."

"I definitely feel better prepared to start applying for graduate jobs and honestly think that this training has helped provide me with ways to gain that edge over other candidates."

"I'd just like to say I thought the training was great. Good opportunity to learn more about the skills employers are looking for when applying for jobs after university. I especially thought that looking through the eyes of the employers and interviewers was useful to help understand what they are looking for and how to make applications stand out."

Students' Evaluation of Training Session

Staff involved

Emma Stephenson
Project lead, University of Exeter

Claire Dimond
Graphic Science

Jayne Stanyer
Plymouth University

Karl Devincenzi
University of Exeter

Liz Simmons
University of Bath

Paul Hartley
Devon Education Business Partnership

Richard Prest
University of Exeter

Rowanna Smith
University of Exeter