The undergraduate research experience as a vehicle for employability development-The student participants speak.

Abstract

The employability of science graduates if of key concern. Employers report that STEM graduates lack appropriate employability skills and work experience, and science graduates take longer to find full-time work than graduates from many other programs. Undergraduate research experience (URE) is an important pedagogy that involves student immersion in a professional research environment-as such it provides an opportunity for science students to develop their understanding of the world of work, and of their own developing employability. In this study, we examine students' reflections on their URE learnings and their resultant perceived employability. We ask whether students understand the value of the URE as an employability development vehicle and consider what can be done to improve the employability learnings from the URE. The results show that students articulate multiple learnings from their UREs, but they struggle to translate these learnings into an employability or non-research-work context. We conclude that UREs are important opportunities to learn about work in science, but that URE students would benefit from URE curriculum components that foreground the way UREs can help develop students' employability. The insights from this study can help inform and refine future URE programs to improve their efficacy as vehicles to benefit graduate employability.