Partnerships and career development learning: Creating equitable shared futures

Abstract

Quality career guidance, or career development learning (CDL), has the potential to lessen the gap in educational and employment outcomes of students from different socioeconomic backgrounds, but current approaches to CDL have been criticised as being inadequate. This paper explores the role that multi-stakeholder partnerships can play in providing access to career skills, knowledge and experiences for students from all backgrounds that enables them to achieve their educational goals and position themselves as tomorrow’s “future-ready” graduates. Drawing on interviews and qualitative surveys with students, parents and key stakeholders in Australian career development, we explore the benefits and challenges of linear partnership models and make recommendations for more holistic approaches.