How should candidates use RAPID?
The RAPID Progress File is a personal and professional development tool designed to assist students / graduates in making smooth progress throughout their professional career in the industry. How you decide to induct your students / graduates in the use of the Progress File and the extent that you wish them to use it is up to you. The following advice is given to help you devise an appropriate method of inducting your students / graduates in the use of RAPID.
You may wish to adopt the following three-stage procedure when using the RAPID Progress File for the first time:
Stage One:
Firstly, your students / graduates should complete the PACE component of the Progress File. They should complete some, if not all, of the following records:
- Personal Details: name, address, d.o.b. etc.
- Personal Statement: a 500-word account of your achievements, interests, strengths, characteristics etc.
- Academic Achievements: qualifications gained.
- Other Achievements: e.g. in sport, music, arts etc.
- Career development plan: an outline of your current professional plans and goals.
- Employment History: including industrial placements, and detailing name of company, nature of work, dates etc.
- Employment Opportunities: a dossier of job adverts and details (for future reference).
- DIS record (summary): for Loughborough University students only
Evidence that supports the above records (certificates, newspaper articles, testimonials, reports etc.) should be maintained and / or referenced in the Evidence Folder. Your students / graduates may wish to scan in relevant documents here. At the very least, they could have a record of the location of all relevant evidence.
It is anticipated that it may take a little time to complete the above record. Students / graduates are likely to already have most of this record in one form or another.
Once a student's / graduate's record is complete, they are likely to want to update it, as required.
Students / graduates do not need to complete this stage before starting Stage Two.
Stage Two:
In the second stage your students / graduates should complete the Skills Audit function of the SPEED component of the RAPID Progress File. The Skills Audit requires them to assess their own level of competence for each stated skill.
Further advice is available to assist them in this process.
The Skills Audit covers three different categories of skill: Key skills, Personal and Professional skills, and Technical skills.
At this stage, students / graduates can decide which of these skills they wish to audit.
As a general rule,
- Undergraduate students may find the Key and Technical skills more relevant to them at this stage.
- Graduates working towards ABE membership may find that the Personal and Professional skills, and the Technical skills are more relevant to their needs.
By auditing a broad and comprehensive range of the skills, the student's / graduate's strengths and weaknesses should become more apparent.
Once a Skills Audit has been completed, the student / graduate might wish to return to those same skills at regular intervals (say 3 to 6 months) to assess whether their level of competence for these skills has changed, without being directly planned for through the SPEED skills development process. Such regular monitoring should also help identify new evidence that may have been generated.
When assessing their competence in a particular skill, students / graduates will find the following information presented:
- Category of Skill: e.g. Key Skill
- Skill area: e.g. Communication
- Specific skill: e.g. Making Presentations
- Four statements to help them assess their level of competence in this skill
The following prompts will also be presented:
- A prompt to recall and reflect upon experiences before deciding which statement best describes the current level of competence
- A prompt to indicate the chosen statement in the grid provided
- A prompt to record evidence that supports the claim of competence that has been made in the grid provided. Three separate pieces of evidence can be recorded
- A prompt to state the location of each piece of evidence cited.
Click here for an example of the format
You may wish to consider the following points when completing your Skills Audit:
- When considering which statement best describes competence in a specific skill, it is best to not agonise over your decision. If the student / graduate cannot confidently say that your competence covers the description given for a particular statement (e.g. statement C), then they should only claim competence at the previous statement (e.g. statement B).
- Evidence should be as specific as possible. Stating an A-level in Maths to support a claim of competence in a Numeracy skill is, by itself, not sufficient, because it does not guarantee that the student / graduate can perform that particular skill to the level of competence claimed. An example of an exercise completed or a problem tackled (that is supported by an objective assessment of the work) would be much better.
- An indexing system could be adopted to cover the location of any evidence that is cited.
- As general guidance, the level of competence is most likely to fall within the range A-B if the user is at the beginning of their planning studies, B-C if they are nearing the completion of their planning studies, C-D if they are a graduate with at least 12 months experience in a managerial capacity. Competence will also vary according to the type of skill concerned (e.g. a recent graduate may have a high level of competence in the Key and Technical skills but a relatively low level of competence in the Personal and Professional skills.
Once this stage has been completed the student / graduate may move on to Stage Three.
Stage Three:
The third stage involves students / graduates in following the process as laid down in the SPEED component of the RAPID Progress File. The process that they are advised to follow is as outlined in the cycle of activities and the accompanying table
Your students / graduates may wish to consider the following points when following the SPEED process:
- The Skills Audit should be used to help identify strengths and weaknesses. This should reveal what may be their skill development needs and goals. They can then decide which skills they need to develop and / or what evidence they need to support their claims of competence.
- They should use the 'Useful Links' provided on the SPEED introductory page to identify possible sources of help.
- When producing an Action Plan, they should identify task(s), set targets, and produce a timetable of activities. Plans should be monitored and revised as tasks are carried out.
Additional advice on action planning is available here
- On completion of the activities listed in your the development plan, students / graduates should spend some time reflecting upon the activities that they have been engaged in to identify which aspects of the methods used worked and which did not. They should consider whether their activities revealed skills and competencies that they had not anticipated.
Additional advice on how to review, reflect upon, and evaluate your activities is available here
- All development of skill competence should be recorded. In addition, any evidence that has been generated should be safely stored.
The processes of skill development and evidence gathering within the RAPID Progress File is an on-going activity. There is no time-scale dictating the progress of the process. Students / graduates would be advised, however, to be working on some aspect of the RAPID Progress File throughout their degree programme and professional training.