Faculty have the most direct and regular contact with our students and thus play a pivotal role in their career success. Through coursework, advising, research and other experiential activities, students learn and gain invaluable skills. The one issue is students not always having the ability to articulate the skills learned in the classroom and beyond to potential employers or graduate schools on resumes or during interviews. This is where faculty can make small changes to syllabi and classroom discussions that will have a huge impact on future career success.

A recent article from the National Association of Colleges and Employers entitled “The Value of Faculty Connecting Classroom Lessons to Career Success” discusses the critical importance of this work for student success and provides some strategies. It is not about making any real changes to what is taught or how in the classroom, just drawing more attention to how the work done in class matches to the NACE Career Readiness Competencies that employers and campuses have identified as critical skills sets in the workplace that students need to articulate and show skills in. Teaching students how what they are learning matches these critical skill sets will help them best market themselves in the future and see additional value add to their experiences.

Steps for this do not need to be complex:

• Review your current syllabi and curriculum up against the competencies and identify synergy
• You can add those skill sets as a key to the learning outcomes on the syllabi
• In classroom discussions of a certain project or topic, talk briefly about how they are learning said competency and how important it is for their careers
• Consider brief pre and post coursework surveys where students self-evaluate their level of competencies to show the growth through your work

The article provides additional information on how to start the process. Again, this is work you already are doing, it is just helping the students see additional takeaways from their experiences. For more resources, visit the NACE Competencies website with additional links and information. Our office is always happy to collaborate together, so contact us to discuss more!