Training career development professionals

The results of a 2021 survey of CDANZ and CATE career practitioners show that only 29% of respondents hold career-specific graduate or postgraduate qualifications, and only 20% hold post-graduate career-specific qualifications (Young, 2022). As CDANZ now requires members seeking professional-level status to have a postgraduate career-specific qualification (Smidt & Bailey, 2019), this means that there is a need for postgraduate study options in Aotearoa.

Postgraduate programmes are those where the majority of study is more independent, intellectually demanding, outcome and delivery-oriented, and assessed via fairly stringent examinations (McPherson et al., 2017). At present, there is only one postgraduate qualification ostensibly for career practitioners in Aotearoa: a professional practice Masters delivered through the Te Pūkenga Otago Polytechnic campus (Miller & Furbish, 2015). Although not specifically designed for career practice, this programme has been marketed as a postgraduate research (PGR) programme designed for those who work in the field to undertake without taught components.

Postgraduate taught programmes (PGT) and research (PGR) programmes are different. In PGT programmes a research component may or may not be present; but if it is present, it will form a much smaller part of the overall qualification than in PGR programmes. PGTs tend to cater to graduate students with a range of experience, backgrounds and approaches to learning, who have multiple commitments to balance alongside study – such as work and family responsibilities (Coneyworth et al., 2020). PGTs may well be studied part-time while the student continues working, aiming to become more skilled in their career (Artess & Hooley, 2018). The commitment and resources committed to this type of study are significant, and the return on investment must be visible to the student (Artess & Hooley, 2018; Coneyworth et al., 2020). As career practitioners appear to enter career practice from other fields (Young, 2022), addressing new practitioner knowledge gaps via PGT seems a more vocationally apt solution (Artess & Hooley, 2018) than PGR as students new to the field don’t know what they don’t know. Further, research exploring delivery specifics within a range of CICA-endorsed PGTs in Australia found that practice specialisms were under-catered for (Brown et al., 2019). 

Tertiary providers need a range of courses available allowing practitioners to align their learning with their speciality (Brown et al., 2019), and we can see by the image accompanying that post just how complex and varied the roles are requiring career development training in New Zealand (CDANZ, 2023). 

However, at present there are few educational options available in Aotearoa. So what do we do? What should we do? What CAN we do? 

Sam

References:

Artess, J., & Hooley, T. (2018). Chapter 27: Towards a new narrative of postgraduate career. In R. Erwee, M. A. Harmes, M. K. Harmes, P. A. Danaher (Eds.), Postgraduate Education in Higher Education (pp. 521-538). Springer Nature Singapore Pte Ltd.

Brown, J. L., Healy, M., McCredie, T., & McIlveen, P. (2019). Career services in Australian higher education: Aligning the training of practitioners to contemporary practice. Journal of Higher Education Policy and Management, 41(5), 518-533. https://doi.org/10.1080/1360080X.2019.1646380

CDANZ. (2023). Career Development - A lifelong process [image]. Career Development Association of New Zealand. https://cdanz.org.nz/Image?Action=View&Image_id=462

Coneyworth, L., Jessop, R., Maden, P., & White, G. (2020). The overlooked cohort? – Improving the taught postgraduate student experience in higher education. Innovations in Education and Teaching International, 57(3), 262-273. https://doi.org/10.1080/14703297.2019.1617184

McPherson, C., Punch, S., & Graham, E. A. (2017). Transitions from undergraduate to taught postgraduate study: Emotion, integration and ambiguity. Journal of Perspectives in Applied Academic Practice, 5(2), 42-50. https://doi.org/10.1080/0309877X.2017.1359502

Miller, J. H., & Furbish, D. S. (2015). Chapter 36: Counseling in New Zealand. In T. H. Hohenshil, N. E. Amundson, & S. G. Niles (Eds.), Counseling Around the World: An international handbook (pp. 349-357). American Counseling Association.

Smidt, A., & Bailey, R. (2019). Entry-level Qualifications and Member Pathways: Discussion Document for CDANZ members. Career Development Association of New Zealand. https://drive.google.com/file/d/1YNaZkSBOAI8YxP7WUGCdswhgPKCPFVl/view

Young, S. (2022). A snapshot of Aotearoa NZ career practitioners [Manuscript submitted for publication]. Social Sciences, NMIT/Te Pūkenga.