Dr Emma Bolger

December has been a busy month! I have left my job at Skills Development Scotland as a gender equality adviser and have taken up a new post at the University of the West of Scotland, lecturing in careers guidance. Many careers professionals across the UK and beyond will know that my move to UWS marks the end of an era! It’s quite something to step into the shoes of the two well-know, valued and extremely experienced outgoing members of staff, Graham Allan and Janet Moffett. An online message book has been set up for Graham and Janet, which can be found here: http://farewelljandg.123guestbook.com/ Information on the career guidance and devemopment programmes at UWS can be found here . 

Earlier this year, I became a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy, having completed an independent research project into my professional practice.  My research project looked at the use of career guidance skills in university teaching.  Enabling people to reach their career potential is the responsibility of everyone involved in education. Post-course employability is at the forefront of my own approach to teaching; working in careers prior to and whilst teaching and bolstered with the postgraduate qualification career guidance and development (and a PhD rooted in career development theory on its way). The (abridged, it was quite long...) research project may be of interest to:  careers researchers, careers professionals,  creative/cultural industry academics, the wider HE community.  I hope it may also be of help to others who have portfolio careers in the creative and/or careers sectors and are considering applying for HEA fellowship. My project is available here as a Google

Delighted to have been been told today that I have been recognised as a Fellow of the Higher Education Academy for my research project on creative writing and employability. 

View original post at https://ayrshirecollegeblog.wordpress.com/2016/03/01/guest-post-emma-bolger-on-tackling-gender-imbalance-in-modern-apprenticeships/ Guest post – Emma Bolger on tackling gender imbalance in Modern Apprenticeships Emma Bolger is National Training Programmes Equality Adviser at Skills Development Scotland where she focuses on equality in Modern Apprenticeships, particularly for young women. We asked Emma to tell us a bit about her job. Here’s what she had to say.  My job is to challenge the belief that there are ‘jobs for boys’ or ‘jobs for girls.’ That’s why it is great to be supporting the Equality Challenge Fund project at Ayrshire College – a positive, dynamic and inspiring campaign aimed at increasing the interest of girls and women in science, technology and engineering apprenticeships, and targeting gender balance in these sectors. Why focus on women? I am often asked the question ‘Why does the focus always seem to be on women?’ There are three reason

In December I attended the Scotland Policy Conferences Keynote Seminar: 'Developing the Young Workforce' - next steps for skills development and apprenticeships in Scotland . The briefing document is now available for purchase and has been distributed to delegates, contacts in government, the Scottish Parliament and other stakeholders. I contributed a short article to the briefing document, which is published below. For reference, a full list of the conference contributors can be downloaded here . There was much discussion at the Keynote Seminar of the need for diversity and consideration of equalities within apprenticeship provision. Reference was made by the Cabinet Secretary and Damien Yeates to the recently launched Skills Development Scotland Equality Action Plan for Modern Apprenticeships. Equalities should be seen to lead the development of apprenticeship provision in Scotland. My specialist area is gender bias in Modern Apprenticeships and for me, it was interesti

I'm looking for current or past students of Open University module A215 Creative writing  to complete a quick survey for a research project I am doing. I'm looking at the career planning of students on this module and will be using the data collected to initially provide context for a research project into my own teaching practice. I plan to adapt the findings for wider dissemination and publication later in the year. You don't have to be one of my students to complete the survey, you just need to have studied or be studying A215. The survey is here  https://www.surveymonkey.co.uk/r/DVS7XW5 ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------ UPDATE:  Survey now closed. Target of 100 responses received in 24 hours, clearly a topic of interest! ------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------------