USF launches new career readiness initiative

• September 5, 2024
• Student Success

By Donna Smith

USF is introducing initiatives this fall to help undergraduate students more quickly identify their career goals - ensuring they gain real-world experience and helping them land jobs in their fields or admission to graduate school.

The efforts are part of USF's Quality Enhancement Plan, a strategic initiative focused on student success and learning outcomes. It integrates career readiness into the academic experience, provides targeted support and streamlines resources for students and faculty.

"Experiential-centered learning has proven to be instrumental in making sure that our students are engaged in their learning process and will typically help them graduate in a timelier fashion and have greater success in their career fields." - Addye Buckley-Burnell

Studies have shown that high-impact practices, such as internships, co-operative education, student employment and undergraduate research - the core of the QEP - have proven to not only improve the quality of employment, but correlate with higher incomes.

"If we focus our attention on expanding these particular high-impact practices, we can help students achieve their goals after graduation," said Addye Buckley-Burnell, associate vice president and executive director of USF's Center for Career & Professional Development.

In an effort to increase career readiness, USF is deploying several strategies, including the launch of the Career Navigator module for first time in college and transfer students. The module consists of assessments and information on career development and tools for growth. It also helps students better evaluate majors and careers, ensuring they've obtained the necessary skillets to enter the workforce.

Since some students can't afford unpaid experiential learning opportunities, USF is seeking alternative funding sources - including crowdsourcing - to help students take advantage of internships and research. USF is also transitioning some federal work study campus jobs into internships.

"Unpaid internships are a hard sell to students who have bills to pay, so we want to remove that obstacle," Buckley-Burnell said. "In addition to sourcing new funds, we are reimagining the incredible amount of federal work study jobs on our campus. Many of these are internships, in reality, but they're not looked at the same way because we call it a student job."

Another key aspect of the initiative is the launch of three pilot modules that will offer specialized, program-specific career content for students in the fields of philosophy, interdisciplinary social sciences and sociology. Faculty in these disciplines will be integral to the success of the initiatives, integrating career readiness competencies into their syllabi, as well as providing a structure in which students reflect on their experiences.

"This has to be something that the faculty are talking about with their students," said Tim Henkel, assistant vice provost for teaching & learning and director of USF's Center for Innovative Teaching and Learning. "We have to more explicitly show how the courses and experiences students are having relate to the careers that they're aspiring to."

In order to assist students with resume and interview preparation, the program-specific modules integrate Quinncia, which uses artificial intelligence to provide automated resume reviews and practice interviews. The modules will also utilize Handshake, a centralized career hub for students with internships and employment opportunities, employer events and other resources students can use to connect with future employers and market themselves. To make the experiences more meaningful, students are offered an internship course with assignments designed to promote reflection and allows that to be noted on their transcripts.

To assess career readiness competencies of USF students, the Career Readiness Report has been implemented and embedded into a variety of courses and experiences. With this tool, students can solicit feedback from faculty, supervisors and peers while receiving AI feedback on how to build in areas needing growth.

Henkel says one of the biggest goals is to make undergraduate students aware of experiential-centered learning and the benefits of engaging in one or more opportunities for their success after graduation.

"This is the pilot year, and so we're going to talk a lot about the QEP, with the goal of getting students excited and asking questions about experiential learning and looking to get involved," Henkel said.

More information about the QEP can be found here.