At our university, feedback from final year biomedical students indicated they were unaware and anxious about their employability skills and career options. To address these concerns, in 2015 a team of careers and biomedical staff developed and embedded a professional development program into the biomedical curriculum. The program contains modules, each assessed via the development of an eportflio (using Mahara). The assessments involve students reflecting on career-related experiences, mapping their networks, communicating evidence of their skills for advertised jobs and defining goals. There have been issues with the integration of the program into the curriculum such that students can understand their progression from one module to the next. This has partially been addressed by setting up a dedicated on-line learning site (using Moodle). However, this integration will be further improved when students can directly access Mahara via Moodle. The ongoing challenge is to ensure that the eportflios are truly transferable.

1. Using an assessed ePortfolio to
enhance student employability skill
development and careers
management
Dr Julia Choate (deputy biomedical course convenor)
Sandy Cran (careers program coordinator)
Dr Maria Demaria (program coordinator)
MONASH
BIOMEDICAL
SCIENCES

2. 2
THE NEED FOR A PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
PROGRAM – NEW PATHWAY INTO GRADUATE MEDICINE
2014: pathway into
graduate Medicine
Monash undergraduate biomedical
sciences cohort
2013 2015 2017
Significant  student numbers
200 550 590
Changes
in career
aspirations
Research 20% 5% 4%
Graduate
Medicine 53% 80% 70%

3. 3
THE NEED FOR A PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
PROGRAM – FINAL YEAR STUDENT FEEDBACK
Final year students (2014) focus group feedback:
- they did not understand that they were developing employability skills during their
course (content/discipline focussed);
- they said that (early) career planning could have assisted them with the uncertainty
about careers options (apart from medicine and research);
- they had not engaged with developmental activities to build their skills and
employability.

4. 4
AIMS OF THE PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT PROGRAM (PDP)
 To challenge unhelpful beliefs regarding linear career pathways;
 To explore and build career options;
 To assess capabilities and development needs;
 To build a record of experiences, skills, knowledge and capabilities that
demonstrate employability.
https://www.kent.ac.uk/careers/sk/skillsactionplanning.htm

5. 5
 Each module consists of:
– A lecture
– An assessment task
– Guest speakers
BIOMEDICAL SCIENCE PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
PROGRAM (PDP) - OUTLINE
ePortfolio

6. 6
RESOURCES FOR STUDENTS – A DEDICATED MOODLE SITE
 Allows students to
understand their
progression
through the
program

7. 7
BIOMEDICAL SCIENCE PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT
PROGRAM (PDP) – ASSESSMENT TASKS
 Each worth 2% of the core unit
 Completed as contributions to an ePortfolio in Mahara

8. 8
MODULE 1 EXAMPLE:
CAREER-RELATED EXPERIENCES

9. 9
MODULE 2 EXAMPLE:
PERSONAL AND PROFESSIONAL NETWORKS

10. 10
SKILL REQUIRED EVIDENCE OF SKILL AND IDEAS TO INCREASE THE SKILL LEVEL
Ability to cope with stressful
situations
Ability to work as a team with
people from different backgrounds
and fields of work
MODULE 3 EXAMPLE
SKILL DEVELOPMENT FOR ADVERTISED JOBS

11. 11
MODULE 4 EXAMPLE:
STAR TECHNIQUE FOR SKILL COMMUNICATION
Situation
What is the background or specific
experience.
Task
What needed to be done to address the
problem and the strategies you considered.
Action
What you actually did and how you did it.
Include the difficulties and problems you
faced.
Result What was the outcome.
“The STAR technique was the most useful thing [about the
program] – this should have been in first year.”

12. 12
MODULE 5 EXAMPLE:
SMART METHOD FOR GOAL SETTING

13. 13
2015 = 90%
2016 = 86%
2017 = 91%
“Assessments gave me the motivation to do it.”
“The assessment made me sit down and actually think about it
[i.e. my career development].”
“It is important to have assessments or people wont do it.”
“Having an assessment is unnecessary. This is simply to help
our careers and shouldn't be related to our mark in the subject.”
High submission rates:
STUDENTS WERE GENERALLY POSITIVE ABOUT ASSESSMENTS

14. 14
WHAT DID STUDENTS THINK ABOUT THE ePORTFOLIOS (MAHARA)?
“The most confusing was the [Mahara] submission. Once I didn’t submit
and I did not realise this.”
“Not very user friendly – I spent more time trying to figure out how to use
Mahara than thinking about the content.”
“I like the idea of keeping a portfolio throughout the undergraduate
degree, to keep track of what I have achieved and be able to reflect
on past experiences and goals.”
They would prefer to use Moodle (or to
have Mahara integrated into Moodle).

15. 15
ADDRESSING STUDENT CONFUSION REGARDING
USING MAHARA – TEMPLATE PAGES
“I thought the templates were helpful”

16. 16
“It was good to know that there is a team that I can talk to and discuss
career related issues/ problems that may arise during my studies.”
Biomedical student individual extracurricular sessions with a careers
education consultant
THE PDP WAS ASSOCIATED WITH INCREASED
INTERACTIONS WITH UNIVERSITY CAREERS ADVISORS

17. 17
THE PDP WAS ASSOCIATED WITH IMPROVED STUDENTS’
EMPLOYABILITY SKILL CONFIDENCE AND AWARENESS

18. 18
THE PDP WAS ASSOCIATED WITH IMPROVED
STUDENTS’ CAREERS AWARENESS

19. 19
CHALLENGES FOR THE FUTURE
 Continuing to address student confusion regarding the use of
Mahara
 Ensuring that ePortfolios are truly transferable

20. 20
• Students valued the program
• Increased student confidence and awareness
about careers options and employability skills
• Need better integration of the ePortfolio (Mahara)
into the existing on-line learning system (Moodle)
This project is supported by a Monash University Better Teaching,
Better Learning grant.
Julia Choate is supported by a Monash Education Academy
Fellowship.
CONCLUSIONS AND FUTURE DIRECTIONS