Editorial

Abstract

Welcome to Volume 7of the Journal of Teaching and Learning for Graduate Employability.

Higher education is experiencing ‘interesting times’ in most parts of the globe: in the United States, for example, key themes include digital innovation (MOOCs) and the rising costs of higher education and associated student debt. In the United Kingdom, a recent White Paper proposes a Teaching Excellence Framework. And in Australia we have tightening budgets, the demise of our quality enhancement body, the Office for Teaching and Learning, and increased resources for quality assurance, including the web-enabled Quality Indicators for Learning and Teaching (QILT). Most jurisdictions gather and report graduate employment data, but often these data are predicated on twentieth century ideas about the world of work. In Australia, for example, the percentage of graduates in full-time and part-time employment is reported, and the unwritten assumption is that full-time work is the aim for all, and the higher the percentage the better the educational institution. As we approach the unknown future of work, and embrace the ‘gig’ economy where work is increasingly sporadic, short-term, flexible and online, the challenge we face is to devise indicators that reflect that university graduates are appropriately employed –or creating their own employment, and that they have the skills to do so. While being employed is often a key goal, being regarded as a 'good employee’ is perhaps even more important. Are employers satisfied with higher education graduates? This is a notoriously difficult question to answer –firstly because the employers are difficult to engage in surveys and similar data gathering mechanisms. In the age of platform economics and digital innovation, there must be a solution to gathering and reporting such information at scale –perhaps this is a solution that enterprising graduates might solve in a startup.