To gain employment and a fulfilling career, students need to understand the skills and knowledge that are important and how to articulate and evidence their employability. Here we report on research investigating science students’ priorities related to immediate employment vs. long-term employability and the factors that students perceive as important to these. We interviewed 138 science students from four Australian universities and found that they were most focused on immediate employment. Students were keen to participate in opportunities to ‘value add’ to their degree, especially those that might help them to gain relevant work experience and professional networks. However, students’ understanding of the relative importance of experiences and skills that would enhance their employability was variable, as was their understanding of the career pathways that they might pursue. Our analysis highlights the importance of explicitly designing curriculum to help students understand the career opportunities available; the skills and abilities needed for diverse careers; and the experiences through which they might develop and evidence these. Furthermore, to engage students, we need to help them to address their greatest and most immediate concerns about gaining employment at graduation, while also setting them up for successful and fulfilling careers.

One of the primary goals of tertiary education is to prepare students for employment. There is debate as to whether university courses adequately provide students with 21st century workplace skills (Kaminski, Switzer, & Gloeckner, 2009; Kivunja, 2014). In a rapidly changing workforce, institutions must constantly adapt to maintain the practical utility of their courses. A thematic analysis was conducted to explore the degree of alignment between graduate attributes, accreditation requirements and industry employability criteria in nursing, psychology and education courses at an Australian University. Graduate attributes were obtained from the Course Approval and Management System. Relevant accreditation requirements were sourced from the respective bodies. A search of advertised job positions for the three discipline fields was conducted from a popular job-search engine (SEEK) to ascertain employability criteria. This analysis identified clear alignment between the university’s graduate attributes and the standards articulated by accreditation bodies for psychology, nursing and education. However, there were differences between graduate attributes and the employability criteria identified by job searches across the three disciplines. Analysis of the employability criteria suggest that employers seek and prioritise graduates who possess practical competencies and 21st century skills such as problem solving and communication. However, there was little to no mention of cultural understandings and attitudes towards inclusion and diversity, both a core graduate attribute and an aspect of professional accreditation. The findings of this study may inform the development of future graduate attributes that better reflect preparedness for the workforce. Alternatively, a reflection on graduate attributes and professional accreditation criteria might produce job advertisements that better reflect work contexts in an increasingly diverse society.

Recognising implicit employability attributes within discipline-specific program modules is a critical part of the process of developing new employability modules in the management sciences curricula. The notion of graduate employability has gained acceptance in the higher education sector across the world and furthermore higher education and industry appear to have reached consensus on the importance of enhancing graduate attributes through the curricula at university. This paper offers a qualitative analysis of curricula documents to determine strategies that are effective in enhancing graduate employability. Using content analysis to assess six bachelor degree programs in management sciences from selected universities in Namibia, the study established that, in addition to work-integrated learning modules, there is evidence of graduate employability attributes being implicitly embedded in core curricula and discipline-specific modules. The researchers argue that universities should develop a stand-alone core module specifically to cultivate employability attributes. This should be supported by multiple work-integrated learning experiences for students to practise technical or discipline specific skills and generic employability attributes.

Graduate employability has become increasingly contentious as employers call for greater development, evaluation and benchmarking of student skills and capabilities in university courses. However, the increasing range of graduate attributes and competencies demanded by industry is further pressuring an Australian higher education sector already stretched by greater student numbers and declines in government funding. Given these circumstances, there is a need to better understand employer perspectives of the current and future value of vocational, interpersonal and generic attributes of STEM graduates. A survey of STEM graduate employers showed that vocational skills, such as graduates' abilities to contextually apply and develop knowledge, together with generic skills such as critical thinking and problem solving, were valued most highly. Conversely, self-confidence and independence, along with numeracy and related skills, were valued least by the employers. However, attributes such as flexibility / adaptability, self-confidence, personal planning and organisation and developing knowledge relevant to the position were all predicted to become significantly more valuable in a decade's time. The results of this study suggest that Australian undergraduate STEM curricula, which commonly focus on knowledge acquisition, be redesigned and restructured to provide students with opportunities to apply such knowledge more often, and in real life, industry-based contexts, such as WIL and IBL programs. Through such initiatives, together with greater dialogue and collaboration between academics and employers, employability skills and attributes can be better inculcated in undergraduates, to the benefit of graduates and society as a whole.

Welcome to Volume 4 of the Journal of Teaching and Learning for Graduate Employability. The Journal provides a scholarly forum for the dissemination of research and exemplary evidence-based practice in higher education teaching and learning for graduate employability. Identifying the skills which facilitate graduate transition to professional life continues to be a priority in the higher education sector, nationally and internationally. It is now well recognised in the discourse surrounding ‘work readiness’ that this goes beyond the specific discipline knowledge and skills to encompass the more generic non technical abilities and understandings which enable graduates to participate effectively in the workforce. However, determining a common understanding of these generic capabilities and how to embed them in the curriculum is still the subject of considerable debate. A search of the literature reveals the development of a range of frameworks to capture and organise the relevant capabilities. In Australia, the Australian Qualifications Framework (AQF) articulates a taxonomy of the knowledge, skills and the application of knowledge and skills expected of graduates for each of the qualifications across all educational sectors. Incorporated into the AQF are four broad categories of generic learning outcomes which include fundamental skills such as literacy and numeracy, people and communication skills, thinking skills and personal skills. The Office for Learning and Teaching (previously Australian Learning and Teaching Council) has supported a number of projects which have focussed on graduate capabilities across a range of discipline contexts. Many of these have also developed frameworks to provide a basis to the thinking, conversations and innovations in curriculum design which are necessary to enhance graduate employability.

Welcome to Volume 2 of the Journal of Teaching and Learning for Graduate Employability, which operates on a continuous publication basis: articles will be published as soon as they successfully complete the peer-review process. We welcome submissions on a continuous basis on any aspect of teaching and learning for graduate employability. Within an increasingly accountable and evidence-based higher education environment, graduate employability remains a priority for industry and the professions, students and graduates, and of course, universities and higher education providers. Increasingly, stakeholders want to be assured not only that graduates have the capabilities that count for professional readiness and safe practice, but they have the mat the agreed minimum standard. Ardent conversations are in train in many parts of the world on this very matter: what level of achievement is required for employability and engaged citizenship, how might we measure it, and how might we—students, graduates, institutions—provide the evidence for it. This is one of the issues of interest to the readers of this journal.