Interview ready: a student-led artistic project as an authentic experience to develop Initial Teacher Education students' employability

Facilitating the development of employable graduates has become an important challenge in Initial Teacher Education (ITE) courses globally. In response, the researchers, who are music method lecturers in an Australian ITE course, decided to investigate ways in which they could develop stronger employability skills in their ITE music students. As part of an assessment task in the ITE music method class, the students had to produce their own original musical including writing the music, devising a script, making costumes and planning the choreography. The students also had to direct and produce the musical production. The researchers used this musical production assessment task to identify which skills and understanding the student-led process developed in the ITE students that would support their future employability. They also sought to find out if the experience impacted on the ITE student’s perception of their own readiness for the school job interview process. Data were collected via three focus groups and one semi-structured individual interview, conducted with eight of the ITE music method student participants. The overarching theme derived from the data was the authenticity of the participants’ experience and the way the ITE students were able to transfer the skills and understanding gained into an imagined or current school context. Subthemes were related to specific skills developed such as team-work, communication and process/planning. The knowledge gained from this research will inform the researcher’s future planning for the musical production work to ensure that it is effectively addressing the development of interview readiness and employability skills for the ITE music method students. Combined with the many other relevant professional teacher skills the musical production aims to develop, the research findings will also enable the lecturers to ensure their music method classroom curriculum is responding to the global emphasis on developing employable university graduates.