If you have any questions regarding the Professional Pathways programme, please contact the team at:
professionalpathways@exeter.ac.uk.
Pathways to Professional Services in Higher Education
The Pathways to Professional Services in Higher Education programme will be taking place in 2024 for the first time.
In June 2024, a total of approxiately 20 successful students, selected from a range of disciplines and year groups, will undertake four days of experiential learning, delivered by professional services colleagues at the University of Exeter, followed by completing a 35 hour fully-funded internship within one of our directorates at the University of Exeter.
University of Exeter colleagues can get involved in a Professional Pathway programme by:
- delivering a 1-hour training session
- providing a business project for students to work on during the training
- offering a 35 hour internship within your directorate
If you are a current student, please see our Pathways to Professional Services in Higher Education student page.
We will be delivering the training element of the programme on our Streatham Campus in Exeter between 17 - 20 June 2024. The training is designed to give students an insight into Professional Services in Higher Education, covering as many areas as possible while also providing them with the opportunity to meet professionals working in the different directorates.
As this is the first year of running the programme, we are still organising the training schedule for 2024. We expect these sessions to include training from the following directorates:
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Digital
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Human Resources
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Finance, Infrastructure and Commercial Services
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Education and Academic Services
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External Engagement and Global
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IT Services
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Exeter Innovation
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Research Services
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University Corporate Services
As part of the training days (17 - 20 June 2024), students will work on a group project which will be a sector-related business challenge set by a directorate. This enables students to apply the knowledge and skills gained in their training to a set task and could be of interest for any teams with currently under resourced projects. Students will spend 2 - 3 hours per day from Monday - Wednesday to work on the project together before presenting their findings on the Thursday, the final day of the training. If possible, we'd be keen for those who have submitted a project to attend the presentation day and be on the panel as this is a valuable learning experience for students to present back, plus a great opportunity for you to hear the students' findings and suggestions first hand and ask any follow-up questions. Presentations will take place on our Streatham Campus, Exeter on Thursday 20 June 2024 between roughly 10am - 1pm.
Ideally you would be offering a project alongside hosting an intern as we would then put your matched student intern(s) into the group allocated your submitted project. Your intern would therefore start their internship with you having already gained some initial knowledge of your directorate's area pf wprl and can hopefully hit the ground running when they start their internship with you. Please note, the project task will need to be different to the submitted internship project, however it could tie in and be a good opportunity for your matched student(s) to work on some of the ground work before their internship.
Please note, we have now reached the maximum number of internship opportunities we are able to fund via this year's Pathways to Professional Services in Higher Education programme and are therefore closed.
The role or project must:
- Be within one of the university's professional services directorates.
- Use undergraduate level skills, knowledge and/or experience.
- Aid career development
- Include tasks and responsibilities normally associated with a graduate level position
- Provide training and support
- Be a total of 35 hours and be undertaken either part-time or full-time between 24 June - 5 July 2024.
All students will go through a rigorous recruitment and selection process conducted by the Professional Pathways team, to ensure we select the best candidates.
Students successful in gaining a place on the programme, will be presented with all the internships opportunities on offer and asked to identify their preferences. We will make the final decision of who will be matched to your opportunity and as such, you will not need to undertake any recruitment or selection process of our students.
Once we have identified the most suitable intern for you, we will send you their details in May 2024. We very much hope that you will be satisfied with our selection, however if for any reason this is not the case, you will have the opportunity to withdraw from the scheme. Unfortunately, at this stage of the recruitment process, we will not be able to find a replacement intern.
We ask that all hosts work through a basic induction with their new intern(s). You are welcome to complete your own induction or you may wish to use the Professional Pathways Internship induction checklist we have put together. You can download this checklist here: Professional Pathways Internship Induction checklist.
We have also put together some notes of guidance for hosting an intern via the Professional Pathway programme. You can view these here: Employer Host Notes of Guidance
We ask employers to set clear objectives for their intern(s) and be available to provide information and guidance throughout the 35 hour internship.
The Professional Pathways Team will be available during the internship to support you and your intern(s) should this be required.
At the end of the internship, we ask that you please complete the Feedback Form. This will be emailed to you shortly after the end of the internship and your comments will be taken into account during our evaluation exercise.
All parties (the internship line manager, the Professional Pathways team and the student), must adhere to the Internal Internship Agreement. This agreement ensures the student is committed to the internship and both the internship line manager and the Professional Pathways team understand the remit of their duty of care for the student. This document must be signed by all three parties before the internship can begin.