Work+
Arizona State University — Goal 1 Initiative Work+
Work+ is designed by University College at Arizona State University on the premise that work and learning should be better integrated. Work+ fundamentally redesigns student employment so that it aligns to a student's career goals. Student work presents the ideal platform for student professional and personal growth. It provides a life transformative education that develops their sense of identity, agency, and purpose.
The initiative empowers students by providing resources and storytelling frameworks for taking ownership and advantage of their work opportunities to advance their own personal and career development.
Initiative Differentiators
Work+ is unique in both design and scale. The program aims to reshape the worker-supervisor dynamic, fostering a growth mindset among both parties. ASU is uniquely positioned to lead this initiative, with more than 10,000 on-campus student job opportunities, robust local and national partnerships, and an institutional focus on integration of work responsibilities into student academic life.
Where the power in learning is the action of doing the activity, reflection’s power is in the action of articulating thoughts. In Work+, students create their Professional Story: a narrative of work-related experiences and short reflections to help you realize who you are, what your goals are, and express how you can contribute to the wider world.
Key Interventions and Milestones
Work+ provides opportunities to grow and apply the skills and mindsets for the digital future. Working learners access a myriad of resources to develop eight work competencies valued by employers as top career readiness characteristics.
In departments embedding Work+, supervisors expand their roles to act as career guides and mentors to their working learners. In what is called Work+ Team, Supervisors meet regularly with their working learners, support their professional goals, and guide them in growing and applying new skills.
Expected Impact
With Work+, working learners discover how to be more self-aware through personal reflections. They learn how to use these reflections in storytelling and, over time, build a meaningful, inspiring personal and professional story. This new methodology nurtures a lifelong ability to describe work and learning experiences to potential employers.
