‘I have learned that psychology is linked to almost everything we do.’ Developing and evaluating the impact of a work–based learning module in an undergraduate psychology programme.

Abstract

Providing structured work experience for undergraduate psychology students is seen by many authors, employers and students as academically desirable and the Dearing Report (1997) indicates that work experience is something which all undergraduates should undertake. It is a problem for psychology degree course administrators to provide relevant work experiences and few courses do this. To provide work experience for psychology students at Glasgow Caledonian University, a second level credit bearing module was developed enabling students who are working part time to capitalise on their part time work. The module requires students to reflect on the job they are doing, the skills they are developing in the work setting and to relate aspects of their psychological knowledge to the job itself. Early evaluation, both qualitative and quantitative, has already shown that the module has been well received by the students and that it is enhancing their learning experiences as undergraduate psychology students.