Abstract
In this chapter, we consider final year students’ perspectives, but also those of staff, on employability, looking at their readiness for work based on students’ formal and informal university experiences and the factors that may affect their graduate outcomes. From this we identify intersecting conversion factors affecting graduate employability: personal and social university. In this chapter, we focus on personal background conversion factors and university conversion factors which shape converting resources into capabilities – although extra-university conversion factors do arise in what students say and both the personal and the university are structurally influenced. We start by presenting understandings of graduate employability, highlighting some of the key graduate attributes considered important.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Notes
- 1.
Model C refers to schools which were only for whites under apartheid and all located in areas designated only for whites pre-1994. From the beginning of 1991, white schools were required to select one of four ‘Models’: A, B, C or D. Model C was a semi-private structure, with decreased funding from the state, and greatly increased autonomy for schools. By 1993, due 96 per cent of white public schools became Model C schools. Although the form of Model C was abolished by the post-apartheid government, the term is still commonly used to describe former whites-only government schools. Fees vary but are generally relatively high. The schools vary in the number of black pupils admitted. Regular government schools are fees free.
- 2.
Employment equity and redress policies require ‘meaningful black participation in the economy’ whereby employers have to increase the quota of black people and historically marginalized groups into professions and management positions which have been largely dominated by white people. The public service in particular has been a place to enable black economic empowerment. The Employment Equity Act is aimed at addressing inequalities of the past which led to the economy being in the hands of the white minority (Babarinde 2009).
- 3.
Ubuntu involves the Africanist philosophy that a person is a person through other people emphasizing our collective bond that connects all persons in their shared humanity.
References
Arthur, J. (2005). Introduction. In J. Arthur & K. E. Bohlin (Eds.), Citizenship and higher education: The role of universities in communities and societies (pp. 1–12). London and New York: RoutledgeFalmer.
Babarinde, O. A. (2009). Bridging the economic divide in the republic of South Africa: A corporate social responsibility perspective. Thunderbird International Business, (51), 355–368.
Brown, P., & Hesketh, A. J. (2004). The mismanagement of talent: Employability and jobs in the knowledge-based economy. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Burke, C. (2016). Culture, capitals and graduate futures. London and New York: Routledge.
Cape Higher Education Consortium (CHEC). (2013). Pathways from university to work: A graduate destination survey of the 2010 cohort of graduates from the Western Cape Universities. Wynberg: CHEC.
Helyer, R., & Lee, D. (2014). The role of work experience in the future employability of higher education graduates. Higher Education Quarterly, 68(3), 348–372.
Hinchliffe, G. W., & Jolly, A. (2011). Graduate identity and employability. British Educational Research Journal, 37(4), 563–584.
Holmes, L. (2013). Competing perspectives on graduate identity: Procession, position or process?. Studies in Higher Education, 38(4), 538–554.
Letseka, M., Cossar, M., Breier, M., & Visser, M. (2010). Student retention and graduate destination: Higher education and labour market access and success. Cape Town: Human Science Research Council Press.
Marginson, S. (2006). Dynamics of national and global competition in higher education. Higher Education, (52), 1–39.
Mkhize, N., 2015. Black social capital should not be wasted. Business Day, June 30.
Rogan, M., & Reynolds, J., 2015. Schooling inequality, higher education and the labour market: Evidence from a graduate tracer study in the Eastern Cape. LMIP Working Paper Series, Paper No. 2, South Africa.
Sen, A. (1999). Development as freedom. Oxford: Oxford University Press.
South African Graduate Recruitment Association (SAGRA). (2013). The SAGRA candidate survey 2013. London: High Fliers Research Ltd.
Teichler, U. (2009). Higher education and the world of work: Conceptual frameworks, comparative perspectives, empirical findings. Rotterdam: Sense Publishers.
Tomlinson, M. (2012). Exploring the impact of policy changes on students’ attitudes and approaches to learning in higher education. York: Higher Education Academy.
Walker, M. (forthcoming). Aspirations and equality in higher education: Gender in a South African University. Cambridge Journal of Education. http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/0305764X.2016.1254159.
Yorke, M. (2006). Employability in higher education: What it is – and What it is not. The higher education academy: Learning and employability series No. 1. http://www.heacademy.ac.uk/resources/publications/learningandemployability. Accessed 24 July 2010.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2017 The Author(s)
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Walker, M., Fongwa, S. (2017). Employability and Conversion Factors. In: Universities, Employability and Human Development. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-58452-6_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-58452-6_4
Published:
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-137-58451-9
Online ISBN: 978-1-137-58452-6
eBook Packages: EducationEducation (R0)