Peer/professional development programs, you, and hopefully me

August 27, 2007 12:51 PM

My GF is searching for information on Peer Development programs in Graduate school, with an emphasis on Professional and community development. If you attended Graduate school of any flavor, perhaps you could help me make her day a little easier.

A Google search reveals a lot of links to 'peer mentoring' programs in Graduate schools, but the vast majority of these are intended to help students cope with stress. The school my GF attends is looking to start a program which is more geared around preparing the student for their future career - licensing exams, making and maintaining professional contacts and relationships, etc.

Specifically, she is searching for structural information; how was the program you were involved with or know about set up? What was the format for the program? What were some of the events? Stuff like that.

+5 if the school in question deals with Psychology. Cheers!

posted by Cycloptichorn to education (3 comments total)

Education departments probably have something related to this...
posted by k8t at 1:03 PM on August 27, 2007

Most MBA programs have this type of structure. Business schools are really just places to meet your future career contacts.

The biggest thing is that in your first year, they tried to partner you with several alums who can give you advice. It's the student's job to contact the alums. Generally, I emailed mine once or twice a quarter with questions regarding interviews or offers.

The goal was to create links between classes of alumni and it was successful to some degree.
posted by 26.2 at 2:05 PM on August 27, 2007

I am currently doing this -

After Grad school I applied for a professional development programme in the shape of a management training scheme offered by a relative professional council. The scheme was highly sought after because it is geared for preparing young practitioners for working in their chosen field and there are lots of training days scheduled into the programme that would cost a lot to access otherwise.

The placement is for 3months. 20+ hours is spent working in an organisation of your choice (the council provide you with a list of partners and you attend interviews to find a suitable choice). Over the 15wk period you also attend 15+ training days including a residential. These focus on learning styles within the workplace, effective networking, negotiations and contracts, presentation skills, people management, IT and office systems, Fundraising, marketing, application tips and interviews, leadership, you within your chosen sector and so on and so forth.

This particular development programme is for art management but the model is transferable as I see it. The best thing to do in the UK is to find such a scheme as I have detailed and to apply. There are always lots of them around in the summer when Graduates begin write-up and decide what the next step to take may be.

I personally feel I will be better prepared for work after completing the programme and it looks great on my resume. I also get a year's membership of the professional body. My particular programme came with a bursary attached and although this is rare, many provide expenses for the duration of the programme.

If nothing like this is available where you are based, then I would suggest she makes contact with a firm/agency/organisation she has a keen interest in and proposing something of the sort. A fesh pair of eyes is not easily refused!
posted by mycapaciousbottega at 2:16 PM on August 27, 2007