Plugging the Skills Gap: New Project to Embed Skilled Graduates into Regional Employment Opportunities

Students will step up to a series of industry challenges set by employers and local authorities as part of a major new project to showcase regional career opportunities for skilled graduates.

Major companies and organisations from across Lincolnshire including Gelder Group, AMP Rose and West Lindsey District Council (WLDC) attended a launch event on Monday 20th May at the University of Lincoln for the first phase of the project which highlighted examples of graduates already contributing to the talent pool of the regional workforce across a range of industries, from construction to accountancy.

The event saw the launch of a collaborative brochure produced by WLDC with the University’s Careers and Employability Team which aims to increase the visibility of employment opportunities for students and graduates in the region – specifically in the Gainsborough area. The brochure, designed by a University of Lincoln graduate intern currently employed at WLDC, marks the start of a new three year project designed to help ‘match-make’ skilled students with regional employers by demonstrating the rich array of career opportunities available for high-skilled graduates in key local industries.

The wider project, which will launch in the Autumn, will see employers set students a range of challenges and industry projects with the aim of demonstrating the value of the transferable skills of university graduates and how they can help to meet the complex challenges facing big business today. In particular, it forms a joint effort to tackle regional skills gaps facing many industries and prevent the migration of talent to other parts of the UK or overseas.

The project, a collaboration between the University of Lincoln, Bishop Grosseteste University, local authorities from across the county, and key employers, is part-funded by the Office for Students through its Challenge Competition.

Mark Stow, Head of Careers and Employability at the University of Lincoln, said: “The launch of this new brochure and partnership with West Lindsay District Council is the start of an exciting new approach adopted by the Careers & Employability team at the University. Working in partnership with our employers across Greater Lincolnshire is fundamental to our ambitions to support the local economies in our region, and a core principle of our ambitions as an anchor institution in our local area.

“The OfS project provides an opportunity for us to not only extend this provision, but also to use the outputs to work with district authorities’ place marketing and graduate attraction strategies, driving increased awareness and visibility of the broad range of opportunities available across our vast region. Showcasing the region to our students, but equally providing a platform for us to showcase the extensive talent we have at the university will be critical, and we are excited to work with our key partners to have a real impact on this agenda.”

Current evidence shows that students who move away from home to study or work are more likely to find highly skilled employment compared to those who stay in their home region. This new initiative from the Office for Students aims to redress this imbalance by funding projects that focus on providing students with training and development links with local businesses, filling the skills gaps of employers in the region with the unique skill set that students can provide.

Amanda Boutell, Senior Project Officer -Employment and Skills from West Lindsey District Council said: “We have students from all over the country who come to study in the region who don’t necessarily know about the employment opportunities that are available in some of the smaller towns in the county such as Gainsborough.

“The brochure that we’ve launched today features ten local businesses from a range of different sectors as well as some of the opportunities, from student placements through to graduate internships that these larger organisations offer. The aim of the brochure is to raise the profile of the kinds of career opportunities that are available in this area.”