Dr Emma Bolger

An article written by myself and Marjorie McCrory will be featured in this month's issue of Career Matters, the Career Development Institute's professional publication.  In our article, The Medium is the Message: Taking a Career Development Approach to Curriculum Design and Delivery at the University of the West of Scotland , we talk about the changes we have brought to the MSc Career Guidance and Development at UWS over the past year since we took over and our rationale for doing so. 

One of the modules I’m teaching this trimester at UWS is Career Development Theory, examining the theories that explain how and why people make career decisions. A career decision I often wonder about is “Why would someone choose to be a careers adviser?” I’m not being flippant; I see few reasons why the media representation of the role would influence anyone to become one. From the outside, it’s not a job that gets good press. There is a heck of a lot of bad-mouthing of the careers profession and its purpose, the occasional high-profile media story (nobody mention  Mary Poppins ) and then there’s the section in every celebrity life story ever: “They told me to/not to do it, the clueless adviser, and they were so, so wrong.” We know that high profile TV programmes boost the profile of certain careers.  CSI  led to a raft of wannabe forensic scientists.  Call the Midwife  and  One Born Every Minute  respectively give young people a dramatised and f...

I am six months into doctoral study, so it is time to make a start on expanding my research away from me, my desk and my supervisors by taking it to an academic and professional audience. I have two events over the next fortnight where I will be presenting the topics of my PhD to peers and practitioners. SGSSS-SDS PhD Event The first of these two events is the inaugural networking event for the Scottish Graduate School of Social Science (SGSSS) and Skills Development Scotland (SDS) Collaborative PhD Programme  to be held on Thursday 12th March .  I will meet the doctoral researchers who are funded under the same scheme as I am for the first time and in a poster presentation, we will be showcasing our research topics. There will also be a number of speakers to network with, including SDS Chief Executive Damien Yeates , Professor Simon Burnett of the SGSSS, Professor Tara Fenwick (ESRC) and Professor Ewart Keep (ESRC/Skope).  SDS Annual Career Guidance ...

A brief post to record thoughts on two issues I’ve been thinking about this week: -  What are the implications if a person thinks of themselves as a trainee or a learner rather than a student and where does an apprentice fit in amongst these titles?  -  What differences exist in experience and perception of a course of study between that which is embedded within a traineeship, internship or apprenticeship rather than as a standalone course? Where this stems from is that I was recently talking to a representative from one of the armed forces about apprenticeships and he–quite interestingly–told me, “most of our trainees are apprentices, they just don’t realise.” I’ve been thinking about the idea that someone might well be in formal or fairly structured learning without realising it, admitting to it or it being made public knowledge. Going off to be a student at 16, 17 or 18 perhaps even dependent on the subject, isn’t always the “coolest” thing to do.* ...