What life lessons can a student hired to file documents learn as your employee?
Thanks to a new tool that helps you define expectations and results, the answer is “plenty.”
WSU’s Student Employment Center (SEC) partnered with the Center for Teaching, Learning and Technology to develop a rubric with criteria and a scoring scale to assess students’ work. A $5,000 grant from the state Higher Education Coordinating Board was awarded in February to fund the project.
“There are five criteria in the rubric,” says Patty Winder, student employment coordinator. “They are: job duties, challenges and opportunity recognition; information and evidence; organization and university learning mission; teamwork and leadership; and communication.
“They provide indicators to help employers know when the student has met an outcome, and to what degree, such as ‘emerging,’ ‘developing,’ and ‘mastering.’ The rubric is different from a performance evaluation in that it incorporates critical thinking, for example.”
This semester, approximately 30 staff supervising 100 students across the university are participating in a pilot study of the program, says Winder. Units participating include Career Services, Student Computing Services, Libraries, the Children’s Center, Health and Wellness Services, and Multicultural Center. The project will continue in the coming academic year, Winder says.
Employers are asked to discuss with student workers what it means to be an employee in the department, the mission, and how it fits into the university. The student employees will write a self-reflection of their work performance. Employers will assess student employee work performance using the SEC rubric.
“The ability to evaluate oneself fairly, candidly and helpfully is a valuable life skill that will be an asset to students long after they leave college,” says Winder.
Student participants in the pilot project also will set up their own e-portfolios where they can provide evidence of learning outcomes tied to the project.
In addition to posting academic and community accomplishments, students will document their mastered workplace skills and competencies and make connections between what they learn in different contexts, says Winder.
“We believe that the student employment rubric is very innovative,” says Winder. “It does require WSU employers as well as their student employees to rethink jobs in terms of outcomes for the student. But just about every employer could use it. We’re very excited about the project.”
For more information please contact
PattyWinder at 335-4892 or pwinder@wsu.edu.
