Institution-Wide Participation
Share ways in which your institution views employment rates in a systemic, institutional way? How do you believe each department works together to improve employment rates, or what would you recommend be done?
Our campus' Admissions team begins by a tour of the campus, including a stop at CS office. I am introduced to them and engage them by telling them what I do.
Academics allows me to do guest speaking throughout the life cycle of the student to maintain and build engaging relationships.
Campus Director supports and offers help whenever needed.
Amber,
It seems as if you have a good process in place and all of your departments are working towards a common goal. I agree completely with your recommendation. We can never forget that we are here for our students, the people.
Sheri Leach
It is amazing to see so many institutions that are on the right track with involvement.
My Team and I are very similar. Each department is very aimed towards the success of the graduates. From admissions painting the path they will go through; Student Services team, and Dean of students offering a variety of support; through our education team restructuring its study halls to meet the needs of our students; to our career services team building the relationships from the beginning to the end with the student body. I believe this flow creates a smooth, simplex structure that works well for our student body.
My only recommendation towards anyone, even in our own team, is to remember that though all of our jobs are systematic or "ratings" jobs, that we remember we work with people, and no one wants to be just a number. But from what I saw of each individual who has posted, they're also going the right direction.
Pamela,
Agreed. Have you thought of ways you can help "control" admissions or other steps that might help?
Sheri Leach
We need more participation from all departments to improve our employment rates. This seems to be coming around but making CS solely responsible for employment rates is crazy. We cannot control who they enroll.
Darcee,
Setting expectations at the beginning is ideal. On your campus, how do all the different departments help the students live up to those expectations?
Sheri Leach
One of our 2014 strategies has been to set a career expectation from day one. We implemented an expectation of professional interview attire for our students at their first day of orientation prior to beginning class. It has been a great way to set a high bar and remember the end goal as well as allow us with the ongoing opportunity to provide our students with feedback during monthly professional Dresss for Success days.
Jennifer,
That is a pleasure to hear! Do your instructors also discuss career related information with the students? If so, how does everyone teach the same thing/send the same message?
Sheri Leach
Our institution does an amazing job at working together to assist our students to be successful from the beginning of their time in school in order to help them hit the ground running when it comes time to find jobs. Our instructors work with career services by having me go into the classroom at certain times and help explain the information. Ie. testing, licensing, resumes, etc. They are also good about helping to talk up employers and get the students excited about working in the industry.
Gretchen,
I commend your institution for working together to enforce professionalism in your students. This is not easy and takes a whole campus to act together. Can you please share how some of the departments keep in touch with the graduates and how they notify Career Services of employment information?
Sheri Leach
Each of our departments begin by being in concensus that student retention is most important. From there we cooperatively work together to mold students into professional graduates. Our Student Services Departments enforce our required dress code and attendance (all directly relating to "outside" success), while our Instructors work directly with Career Services to schedule visits to the classroom where we discuss resume writing skills, interviewing skills and also conduct mock practice interviews. All departments have channels in which they keep in touch with graduates and they all extend back to Career Services where they keep us posted as to someone's employment they gained or where someone might be struggling so we can reach out to them.
Shaundra ,
Thank you for sharing this. You have a good process in place. Placement outcomes definitely increase when everyone on campus is involved and has accountability. And, as mentioned before, instructors are most effective since they have strong relationships with the students and are able to reach them in ways that Career Services is not.
Sheri Leach
At my institution, employment rates are reviewed weekly through Leadership meetings with the Executive Director and Department leaders. The Department leaders then take the information back to their respective areas and share with their team.
If there are programs that have low trending employment outcomes, strategies are discussed to improve the low performing programs.
An example of strategy building activities that have come from institutional collaboration have been weekly accountability meetings with Program Coordinators. Each Program Coordinator has been given a list of "MIA" (missing in action) graduates to assist in contacting them. We have found that sometimes Instructors or Program Coordinators have additional contact information for graduates and/or sometimes graduates have remained in contact with their Instructors/Program Coordinators after graduation. This allows the Education Department to engage with the student and sometimes refocus them on their career goals.
Jose ,
It is a great practice to have all managers provide recommendations to assist with placement. And it is a great best practice when all departments on campus provide Career Services with updated student and graduate information. I agree, that all staff members need to understand and be a part of the campus employment outcomes success story
Sheri Leach
Every managers meeting Director of Career Services presented the employment rate by program. If any program is below the standard, other manager make recommendations and communicate any information they have about the students. Also, employment rate is used as an indicator for the Institutional Assessment and Improvement Plan.
All department need to communicate any information they received from graduate especially Financial Service Advisor and Financial Aid. Also, Registrar communicated with Career Services when they received a student asking for any record and provide up date information about address, phone, etc.
Every staff member need to understand the importance of employment rates and the implication for the school.
Dan, It seems as if your institution has developed a process that includes all departments. Weekly discussions are ideal, as it reinforces the need that employability issues must be addressed constantly, by everyone on campus. Plans such as yours lead to increased employment outcomes and stronger relationships with students/graduates. Have you measured the effect on your outcomes? Any other observations you can share?
During weekly leadership meetings employment rates are discussed for the current cohort graduates by program. All department heads are in attendance and we share information about specific programs and students. Strategies are discussed and implemented among the departments. Each week we analyze the strategies and determine our weekly targets and how they compare to our traction in regards to the yearly benchmarks. Admissions often aides in interviewing skills, the financial aid department helps in locating graduates that are missing, the education department offers refresher seminars and graduate nurturing, and finally the career services department leads the charge in developing community/employer relationships and honing the soft skills of our graduates.
Tom,
Your view from an accrediting agency standpoint is most welcome, especially since it is one not very common in this forum. So that we may have a better understanding of how to improve our schools, (and to spur a discussion) what are some of the best practices that you have encountered that fostered cross- departmental interaction? Can you name a few specifics?
Your point regarding evaluating the need for certain graduates is interesting. How do you propose that an institution do that? Feasibility studies are done before a program is instituted based on a showing of demand. How would an institution continue to check if there is an ongoing need, especially if it requires forecasting employment needs 9 or 12 months later (which is the length of many programs)?
Sheri Leach
Speaking from the perspective of an accrediting agency, we encouraged the integrated, systemic view that is presented in this training course. For example, when an institution reported placement rates below expectations, we would look for placement improvement plans that included activities which fostered cross-departmental interaction, especially between academics and career services.
We would look to see if the institution looked into the relationship between various outcomes, such as employer satisfaction and placement rates, and we would encourage interaction with students from admissions through to graduation.
We also required that institutions made some use of resources from the local business community, including as guest speakers and field trips for academic classes as well as participation on program advisory committees, sources for internships, and career days, etc.
One area that I feel institutions and accreditors should place greater emphasis on is evaluating the demand for graduates from various programs and using that information to control enrollments more carefully.
