A record six students from Macquarie’s Master of Professional Psychology program have been offered NSW Education Department scholarships.

The Department’s Psychology Graduate Scholarship Program supports high-achieving psychology graduates to complete a Master of Professional Psychology and become school psychologists working in metropolitan, regional and rural public schools across the state.

A scholarship covers course costs up to $38,000, plus extras including a textbook allowance, supervised placements in schools, a one-year full-time internship when they finish study, and a permanent position as a school psychologist.

The Department of Education employs more than 1200 staff in the school counselling service across 2220 schools and the number of school psychologists continues to increase.

Master of Professional Psychology Course Director Dr Josephine Paparo says the scholarship program is an excellent pathway for graduates who want to work with children and young people in the diverse environments of NSW public schools.

“All our students do placements as part of the course, but the only way to get a placement in a public school is through this program,” she says.

“Usually, most of the recipients are from universities that offer specialty training programs in school psychology.

“Macquarie’s previous record was two scholarships in a year, so the fact that this year we have received more offers than any other non-specialist psychology program is very pleasing.”

Danya Braunstein, Pratica and Skills Training Co-ordinator in the School of Psychological Sciences, says becoming a school psychologist in the Department of Education requires specific experience that many graduates don’t have.

“Working in schools requires a comprehensive knowledge of assessments, and that’s something that the provisional psychologists can learn during their placements and internship,” she says.

“This is the perfect opportunity for them to learn vital skills on the job.

“This year, we made a concerted effort to support students to apply for the program. We really want them to land well after graduation.”

If you are recruiting, whether for casual, part-time or full-time roles, please contact studentemployment@mq.edu.au.

Student Employment creates opportunities for our students and provides an easier recruitment process for staff looking to fill positions. With an extensive database of skilled and talented students and recent graduates, the Student Employment team can help you find the right talent for your team, with services ranging from advertising positions to motivated jobseekers to shortlisting appropriate candidates.

Recently, for example, the team advertised a casual role for a student to assist with the upcoming Jobs Happy Hour event and received more than 300 applications, many of them from outstanding candidates.

Student Employment is also looking for opportunities for international students and for students with a disability. Typically, these student cohorts face more challenges in gaining meaningful entry-level opportunities to add to their resumes and in turn, usually have lower graduate outcomes. Macquarie can lead by example and find opportunities for these students to assist in their career journeys.

Staff can further support our students by referring Student Employment to a friend or colleague. If you know someone who needs to hire a student or graduate, please encourage them to contact the Student Employment team. For more information, visit the Employer Connect portal.

Held each session, the sole focus of this week is to help our students plan and build their employability by connecting them to internal and external employment experts. Although a student-focused initiative, the content is relevant to everyone and all staff are welcome to register for any of our featured events.

Careers and Employability Week is a cornerstone student event that aligns with the objectives and aspirations detailed in the Draft MQ Employability Strategy.

All faculties are taking a keen interest in making student employability a top priority, and across the University, the week-long event will:

• Demonstrate the Employability and Graduate Success team’s efforts to implement a refreshed and consistent employability journey – both in and out of the classroom
• Showcase the enhanced employability platforms available to enable service delivery to our students as well as employers and industry partners
• Promote a key skills guide that has been developed for students to understand what employers are looking for and how to map, enhance and translate their skills in job applications
• Highlight MQ Student Employment, the program that connects employers with students seeking employment
• Support institutional efforts to progress students’ employability outcomes and success in collaboration with Faculties and through PACE, our Professional and Community Engagement program.

For Professor Dominique Parrish, Pro Vice-Chancellor (Learning and Teaching), the importance of student employability is clear and cannot be understated.

“As the world of work transforms, demands and pressures on an ever-evolving workforce increase.  Macquarie University remains firmly committed to providing the best possible outcomes for its students, especially when it comes to employability skills and careers,” says Dominique.

Deputy Dean (Education and Employability) for the Faculty of Arts, Professor Panos Vlachopoulos, says Arts is supporting Careers and Employability Week with some specific events and is committed to engaging students in employability and careers activities.

“It’s a great chance for students to explore humanities-based career options and on a practical level, they can drop into the Arts Precinct to get a professional photo taken for LinkedIn and ePortfolio profiles,” says Panos.

Everyone can get involved

We’re keen for everyone to take an active interest in our students’ employability and career journey and you can take a few simple steps to support Macquarie University’s employability agenda:

• Encourage students to get engaged at Careers and Employability Week.
• Connect industry partners and employers through our new MQ Employer Connect
• Hear for yourself about the future of employability by registering on our website to attend sessions in Careers and Employability Week, 7-11 March.

As well as connecting potential employers with students looking for work, MQSE focuses on the skills and development needed to obtain employment, including recruitment and application strategies and resources and tools to ensure students can confidently present themselves to employers. MQSE also collaborates closely with PACE to increase continuity of offers for students.

As a free service funded by the Student Services and Amenities Fee (SSAF), the main priority for MQSE is to connect employers with Macquarie students and recent graduates. In 2021 alone, MQSE has been instrumental in recruiting 20 students to jobs around campus and more than 100 jobs externally. Since its inception, the service has worked on recruiting for 362 jobs and received more than 3400 applications for their services – 1800 of them in the first nine months of this year.

Macquarie’s Career and Employment Service has always actively supported its students to find employment, both on and off campus. MQSE goes one step further with active coaching of students to be job-ready and confident in the recruitment process.

“We help students to refine their resume, market their skills to employers, prepare for interview, build confidence and take constructive feedback if they are unsuccessful,” says Mel Ashby, Student Employment Coordinator in the Employability and Graduate Success Team.

“The number of applications we receive and students we are coaching through the recruitment process is a very solid indicator of the value of the program.”

Thriving young professionals

Annie Renouf is an MQSE success story. Currently in her fourth year of an Arts/Law degree, Annie signed up to the service in her second year, after having a great experience in the Career Accelerator program. Since then, Annie has found employment on campus in a number of different roles, and earlier this year joined the Macquarie Park Innovation District (MPID) team as a Communications Assistant.

“MQSE has provided me with a platform and skills to increase my employability, and boosted my confidence with the recruitment process,” says Annie.

“There is a strong commitment to providing an outcome on an application and next steps in a prompt timeframe. Rather than applying for a role and not getting many updates, MQSE is there at each step of the process.”

Annie says engaging with MQSE has helped her cultivate a mindset that she is ‘not just a student’.  “The service has showed me that I am a thriving young professional with a bank of experience that I can leverage as a graduate.”

Things looking brighter for the job market

Mel Ashby says employment figures for 2020 and 2021 have been erratic across the job market, however numbers are substantially up at the moment. “More employers are now reaching out to us for support to re-establish, grow or enhance their talent pipeline, especially  in the last six months,” says Mel.

When it comes to recruiting students for on-campus roles, Mel says it can’t be overestimated how important this can be to a student’s experience – strengthening retention and giving the University a closer connection to student issues.

“Getting work on campus means students are in an environment with an understanding of the required flexibility for study, and it increases on-campus activity and commitment to Macquarie. This approach supports a more holistic student experience that is geared towards employability skills and graduate outcomes.”

Mel and the team are looking to build on MQSE’s success with enhanced offerings for 2022, including developing a Job Ready Club, forming closer connections with relevant social clubs and societies, and building stronger partnerships to meet the needs of employers.

Find out more

If you know a student who is looking to enhance their job-ready skills and find employment, you can direct them to MQSE’s Student FAQs. If you’re interested in using MQSE to fill a position in your area, visit the Employer FAQs, or contact Mel Ashby directly: mel.ashby@mq.edu.au

84 Macquarie students participated in this inter-university competition that challenges teams of students from different disciplines to develop solutions to genuine problems posed by industry partners. 

Macquarie hosted the event for the second year in a row, with eight universities and over 390 students participating. Macquarie was successful in winning 12 out of 17 industry projects – an amazing result.

“Univative is a fantastic program that has exponentially increased and supplemented my networking and group project skills,” says Macquarie Bachelor of Arts student Nikhil Khare.

Working in teams, students from across Macquarie worked with a wide range of industry partners to solve real-world problems. These included Amazon Web Services, Dell, HCL Tech in cooperation with Water NSW, Royal Australian Chemical Institute (RACI), SCARF Refugee Support, Spinal Cord Injuries Australia, Sunrice and Salvation Army, ACCA, AcademyGlobal, ABC, Australian National Maritime Museum, Leor, Pexip, the School Magazine, Veriu Group and VMware.

Among the challenges the students needed to solve were to create a COVID passport for students returning to Australia (for Amazon) and to design a strategy to engage university STEM students across Australia to increase brand awareness and uptake membership (for the RACI).

“Our diversity meant that we often came up with different solutions and ideas, enabling us to consider issues from various perspectives and standpoints,” says Bachelor of Commerce / Bachelor of Psychology (Honours) student Tiffany Wong, who was part of a winning Macquarie team working on the ABC’s project. “Our different interests and studies were also beneficial as we were able to divide work up based on individual’s strengths but also to learn from each other.”

Justine McKenna, a Career Development Consultant in Learning and Teaching, was part of the Univative leadership team. She says the positive outcomes for participants are immense.

“Students can, in a relatively short but intense period of time, learn to effectively solve industry problems and communicate their recommendations to a range of stakeholders,” Justine says. “I love watching how much each student grows both personally and professionally throughout the program.

“Some of the partners involved have already commenced discussions around offering employment, internships, and mentoring opportunities for some of the students who participated.”

The Career Development Consultants team provide comprehensive support to Macquarie staff to enhance student employability.