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A career mentoring tale: A story of assumptions, assessment and action
Journal of Education Advancement & Marketing,
4
(2),
118-134
(2019)
Abstract
In 2009, Thompson Rivers University created a Career Mentoring Program (CMP). The programme mission was to bring career development expertise, from mentors’ personal experiences, to students through career mentoring activities. The initial goals were to teach students networking skills and enhance their understanding of the current labour market. As the programme evolved, so too did the understanding of its impact on students’ career development, and as a result, the goals of the CMP evolved. This paper will outline the evolution of the programme, the mistakes and partnerships that influenced the evolution and how a formal research project solidified the learning programme organisers assumed was happening. The results of conducting this mixed methods research, and using it to improve the programme each year, have had a profound outcome on programme objectives: to increase the career knowledge, confidence and action of students. This paper will demonstrate to other practitioners that programme assessment and research do not have to be difficult or costly. The authors hope that, from this paper, educators will be able to take this experience and tweak or start a relevant and effective programme for students.
Keywords: career mentoring; co-career educators; career confidence; career knowledge acquisition; career action; programme assessment
The full article is available to subscribers to the journal.
Author's Biography
Susan Forseille is a career educator, researcher and, currently, the Director of Prior Learning and Assessment Recognition at Thompson Rivers University (TRU). She is passionate about career development, career education and experiential learning. For the past ten years, she has been researching these topics extensively, including initiating a longitudinal research project on student learning outcomes of participants in the TRU Career Mentoring Program (CMP). The CMP is an award-winning programme initiated by Susan and her colleague Arlene Olynyk in 2009. Recently, Susan has concentrated her research on students’ employment readiness and the variables that influence students’ transition from post-secondary education to meaningful career development. This research is then translated into career education pedagogy that supports students’ career knowledge acquisition, career action and career development confidence. Susan has built an academic career educating students using evidence-based practices to identify, articulate and leverage the skills and abilities they acquired through their education in relation to their personal career development.
Arlene Olynyk has, over the past 10 years, held the position of Manager of Alumni Relations in the Advancement Office at Thompson Rivers University (TRU). She is responsible for all alumni relations activities for all faculties and campuses in this centralised model. Effective partnerships is the primary focus for this shop. In 2016 the innovative approach of the Career Mentoring Program was recognised as the North American Silver Winner for Innovative and Creative Partnerships as presented by the Conference Board of Canada and the International Partnerships Network. Arlene initially joined TRU in Student Affairs and prior to this served as Program Manager in the Faculty of Physical Education and Health at the University of Toronto. In addition to the workplace, Arlene has extensive involvement with local and national sports organisations.
Kristen Hamilton is an education and decision-support professional and holds the position of Manager of Integrated Planning and Effectiveness at Thompson Rivers University (TRU). Kristen specialises in post-secondary student engagement and retention and manages a portfolio that includes course evaluations, new curriculum development and market research, programme evaluation and applied research for institutional improvement. Kristen joined TRU in 2008 and has made multiple contributions to her field in the form of practitioner presentations at various professional organisation conferences.
