Key discussion points from the open meeting:

1. Key discussion points from the open meeting: • What is meant by ‘graduate employability’?  Do we need to clarify and communicate internally the different range of employment outcomes for YSJ courses?  We also need to think about entry salaries of graduates as these will be key in the decisions made by parents and students. • How can we collect other data that demonstrates longer-term career trajectories of our graduates?  We may not look good in, say, Arts courses after 6 months but after 3 years our graduates are doing really well – how can we discover this and communicate it?  Can alumni give us some excellent case studies? • Where do we want to be? • Ultimately, we would like our graduates to be employed because they are YSJU graduates. • Employability and enterprise embedded in everything we deliver and thus not being over-reliant on the marketing of the success of individual graduates.  External placements in all courses might be one strategy.  Surrey, Hertfordshire, Teesside, Plymouth were cited as strong HEIs on this agenda. • Careers advice delivered innovatively (e.g. Apple store model), attracting more students (not just the proactive ones) throughout their course (not just in final year) because they are more aware of what is on offer (physical space of Careers is important, as is awareness-raising by SU and others). Enterprise & Employability

2. Where do we want to be continued… • Providing all graduates with a unique transcript of all the skills and experiences they have picked up at YSJ so that they have an advantage in the employment market. • Engaging with a range of employers so that they help to shape our curriculum and help us to offer external placements across most courses. • We need to be much better at ensuring our students become graduates with excellent key skills, e.g., writing. • We need to ensure our graduates have excellent interview and application preparedness. • Supportive and proactive with graduates starting their own businesses. • Able to find a comfortable balance between challenging students to develop skills on their own, thereby developing their autonomy and resilience (which employers look for) and providing support/services that make it easier for them to develop skills. • Leadership, student engagement, innovative staff, and external contacts will be needed to bring about a step change in graduate outcomes. Enterprise & Employability