The Exeter Award

Work experience can offer you the opportunity to earn money, develop skills and acquire experience relevant to your future career or test out a particular field to see if you would like to work in it.

You can count any paid or unpaid work in any country towards your Award, including part-time work in term time or at home during the holidays, as long as you've done it during your time as a student at University of Exeter. 

If you are a postgraduate student, you can include any work experience completed in the summer before you joined university/ in the two months before you joined university.

Click on the Thinglink below to find out about the range of different experiences that can contribute to the 35 hours of work experience or volunteering.

Click here to view the accessible version of this interactive content

Most volunteering and work experience is accepted for the Exeter Award, but if you're unsure about whether your experience counts, please get in touch with the Exeter Award team.

The Interview Experience is the penultimate section of the Exeter Award and is designed to give you a safe space to practise your interview techniques and to learn from your peers. 

In the session you will have a 10 minute interview with an experienced member of staff from the Career Zone. There will be up to 4 other students and you will be expected to provide constructive peer feedback. You will have the opportunity to learn how you react under pressure and gain feedback on your performance from both the interviewer and your peers.

Sessions run throughout the year during term time, both online, and in person at the Streatham and Penryn campuses. Please note, you need to have had your mock job application form marked and approved and watch the The Interview Experience video before you can book onto The Interview Experience. 

Watch the video below to find out more about what to expect from the Interview Experience.

What questions will be asked?

The interview is a competency based interview with the questions focusing on your transferable skills. Questions may cover skills including:

• communication
• problem solving
• teamwork
• adaptability
• time management
• initiative.

You will not be asked questions relating to your technical knowledge of a specific role. 

Do I need to prepare for the interview?

Before you can book onto a session of The Interview Experience, you will need to watch a video on your Exeter Award pathway. This video will help you consider how you might prepare for an interview and will introduce you to the STAR (situation, task, action and result) technique, a way of structuring your answer to help demonstrate to the interviewer the skills you have. The video can be accessed on your Exeter Award Pathway on My Career Zone once your mock job application form has been approved. You do not need to do anything else before you attend the Interview Experience. 

What happens after the Interview Experience?

Once you have attended a session of The Interview Experience, your Exeter Award pathway on My Career Zone will be updated and the Interview Experience will be marked as complete. In order to complete the Exeter Award you will need to complete the online feedback form. 

Your Exeter Award certificate will be emailed to your university email address within 2 weeks of completion.

Remember you can add the Exeter Award to your LinkedIn or CV.

We recommend you briefly spell out what you actually did to achieve your Award, under a section headed, for example, ‘other qualifications’ or ‘achievements’ or ‘Interests and extracurricular activities’. You could describe the Award as recognition from the University for your extracurricular achievements, and for developing your employability skills through work experience/volunteering plus attendance at a range of skills sessions. Bullet point the components of your Award together with a brief summary of what you gained/learned. Remember to tag University of Exeter Career Zone!

We are committed to making The Interview Experience accessible to all. If you have any questions or would like to discuss any accessibility requirements, please get in touch with us at exeteraward@exeter.ac.uk.

For more information and support on equality, inclusion and diversity please see our specific EDI pages.