Annual Academic Development Symposium 2017

The theme for this year’s Symposium was Moving On, Moving Up. The topic complemented the QAA (Scotland) Student Transitions Enhancement Theme  which is in its final year.

The Symposium provided opportunities to explore the transitions which students make to move beyond their university experience into employment or further studies.

The Symposium took place on the afternoon of 27 April 2017, beginning with three keynote speakers presenting different perspectives on student transitions from the academic, employer and student viewpoints: Dr David Muirhead, Lecturer in the School of Geosciences, Paul Matthews, HR Director at Aberdeenshire Council and Ashley Sevadjian, MA (Hons) English and Creative Writing Graduate.

Click on the titles to view the keynote presentations:

• Transitioning from University to the Workplace: A Student’s Perspective
• Moving On –Moving Up: Student Transitions by Dr David Muirhead
• Moving On, Moving Up by Paul Matthews

The keynotes were followed by parallel ‘swap shops’ to share practice including:

1. The CityLab project, a collaborative venture between the University of Aberdeen, the Robert Gordon University and Aberdeen City Council
2. The School of Psychology’s Social Media project to boost students’ employability by creating a professional online presence
3. The Enterprising Researchers’ Programme, which prepares PGRs for post doctorate employment

The event concluded with the debate "This house believes that ‘employability’ has no place in the curricula of a research-intensive university" chaired by Finia Kuhlmann, President of University of Aberdeen Debater, with Dr Arnar Arnason speaking “for the motion”, and with Beverley Tricker, Managing Director of Tricker PR, speaking “against the motion”.

Programme

Download a copy of the programme.