Get STEM working: innovation with employer and student engagement > Final project report

Final project report

Employer engagement within the undergraduate curriculum provides students with a number of valuable opportunities including:

Real world application of their learning
Enhanced employability
Deeper understanding and knowledge

The central premise of this group of six projects (taking place across different SW universities) was the importance of employer engagement in the curriculum in order to provide contextual relevance, employability skills, and cross-disciplinary applications and working.

The projects within the Get STEM working programme aimed to test a range of approaches to:

Devise realistic and viable methods of engagement for both employer and student
Analyse and trial the extent of cross-disciplinary approaches and transferability between subjects
Produce tool-kits, practical guides and models which can be disseminated to HE providers and employers

Read the final project report below to get more details on how the projects achieved this:

final report

Project Highlights

The range and variety of outputs has been a clear highlight of the overall project. Some projects have transferability between disciplines built-in, others provide pointers to anyone interested in improving employer engagement in the undergraduate STEM curriculum. The overarching programme brings together the findings and outputs into a coherent set of research informed and evidence based approaches.
The exemplary co-ordination and co-operation between the projects within the programme has ensured that the ‘Get STEM Working’ project has met its overall aims and objectives.
The interconnections with other SW projects have been very helpful, for example, a collaborative cross project approach was taken to devising and developing the “Continuum Model”. This model will be useful for HEIs to use and improve accessibility to the work and outputs of the projects through the following themes: Formulating Employer Engagement Strategy; Reviewing Current Practice; Using Labour Market Intelligence; Customer Relationship Management Systems; Relationship Development and Maintenance; External CPD – workforce development; Graduate and Undergraduate employability.