Table of Contents 

Initiatives 
Talent Pipeline Elevating Chicago 
​Addressing Poverty, Racism and Violence 

Forecast Roundtable II:  Identification of skills needed for student success in industry

In partnership with Illinois Technology Association and World Business Chicago, AUC convened this follow-up roundtable on April 20, 2017  to take a closer look at two key issues raised in the first Roundtable held on November 29, 2016. Faculty and industry representatives from Roundtable I were joined by Career Services Executives from some of the institutions to contribute to the conversation.
 
The issues were:

  • Soft skills needed by industry in today’s and tomorrow’s workplace
  • New internship models-role of higher education and industry
 
Based on the discussions, the four groups proposed five pilot projects to develop further the ideas for improving internships and integrating soft skills into curricula:
  1. Learning Contracts:  Focus on development of a standard form that university Career Services Offices can use with employers and student interns to clearly identify the learning aspects of internships so both students and their corporate mentors understand the character of internships.

  2. Alumni Feedback during internships:  Development of a mechanism for alumni-mentors who are providing internships to students to provide feedback to the students and their faculty advisors on the students’ work experience.

  3. Embed Soft Skills Across the Curriculum:  Examination of the characteristics of soft skills needed by industry (focus on the IT industry) and the approaches to teaching them with a view to incorporating them into Computer Science academic programs

  4. Listening/Sales Workshop(s):  Acknowledgement of the critical role of sales in corporate settings and the value of learning how to listen to customers in shaping sales proposals to meet their true needs, by developing a workshop for students to experience and model the process.

  5. Case/Simulation Competitions and Research Platform for Student Success:  Creation of a student competition around the soft skills needed for student success in the workplace, that can become a city-wide effort co-sponsored by the ITA and America’s Urban Campus to promote student understanding of these elements of successful employment.

Student Workshops: How to Meet Customer Need as a Developer
 
In one of the implementing activities of the Forecast Roundtable,  AUC and the Illinois Technology Association partnered with LaunchPad Labs (link to website) to conduct two student workshops at Launchpad Labs in April, 2017.  The Launchpad Labs team co-developed the curriculum with faculty members from Columbia College Chicago and the University of Chicago—focusing on the strategic approach to interpreting the problem the customer is trying to solve through development of an app.  Students in Game Development and Computer Science from the two institutions participated the two, three hour workshops led by Launchpad Labs staff. ​

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