The UO policy on student employment (policy 03.05.02) states that the purpose of the student employment program at UO is twofold: to provide financial assistance to students to help fund their academic studies and to provide valuable work experience. Laura Willey, Assistant Head, Access Services in the Library has shared an article of interest about how colleges and universities can enhance training for student employees and provide valuable experience to prepare them for career positions http://www.academicimpressions.com/news.php?i=231&q=%28%25Code%25%29 .
What efforts have your department made to identify and provide structured opportunities for student workers to learn job-related skills? What successes have you achieved and what have you learned from less-than-optimal results? These job-related, transferable skills may include critical thinking, problem-solving, and communication skills. Have former student workers given you feedback about the skills they learned in a student jobs and those they find valuable in their career job?
What is your reaction to the article? Does it make sense in relation to your experience supervising student workers at UO?
I just read an interesting blog in the Chronicle of Higher Education about the value of student jobs to future careers. This includes a letter from a student worker in the professor’s office and a response from someone who previously had the the same position twenty years earlier reflecting how the student job prepared her for her career. http://chronicle.com/blogs/brainstorm/student-job-questions-asked-answered/40605?sid=at&utm_source=at&utm_medium=en . I would be interested if you have had similar feedback from former student employees.
Over the last several years, Information Services has built such a system for our Help Desk student employees. We identify the skills and knowledge they need to succeed at level 1 of their jobs. When we assess them and determine they have gained those skills and knowledge, we promote them to level 2.
We are fortunate that help desk work is broad and complicated at times because it gives students a broad range of skills and tasks that can apply directly to full time jobs elsewhere. We also have enough student employees (~45) that building a program is worthwhile.
In the next year we are looking to implement the same type of program for the other sets of student employees we have.