About SMI Student Placements
In today’s competitive job market, you need more than a strong academic qualification to achieve your potential as a graduate.
The placement scheme gives undergraduate students the opportunity to undertake high-quality paid work experience on a number of exciting projects with respectable organisations.
Our scheme provides students with an invaluable opportunity to gain workplace experience which, alongside their degree from a world-renowned university, boosts their employability and sets them up for success after graduation.
Each year we work with our partners to offer a number of diverse and exciting placements to our students. Working with our external partners and alongside leading researchers, you will be able to develop highly sought-after skills through direct experience in a workplace.
Summer placements normally last around six weeks, but there are increasing opportunities to work in industry for a whole year, a trend which is becoming more popular amongst students. SMI can help you with this, should you wish to take this route.
Working with our external partners, alongside leading researchers, you will be able to develop transferable skills and attributes through invaluable direct experience in a workplace. The skills developed through work experience is invaluable to a graduate employer, these skills include:
- Communication skills
- Working as part of a team
- Ability to solve problems
- Initiative and enterprise
- Planning and organisation skills
- Self-management
- Project management
- Data handling
- Data analysis
The SMI understands the importance of enhancing your employability and thereby your opportunities after graduation. Through student placements scheme we aim to make your experience at the SMI one of a kind, rendering our students standout graduate contenders in today’s competitive job market.
Some of our partners
What you need to know
- Placements take place over the summer (unless it's a year-long placement)
- Placements usually last six weeks
- Placements are based on a 35 hour week
- Placement students will be paid a bursary, the equivalent of living wage salary.
Information for employers
We are open to collaborations with academic and external to the University partners for the placement programme. If you are a University research project, community organisation or a business and you have an idea for a collaborative research project (between at least one person in your organisation and our student) that involves a research output, such as a report, a briefing, presentation, or piece of qualitative or quantitative data analysis - you are welcome to join the programme.
Please email Dr Christine Huebner to express your interest.
Mae & Charlie are here to tell you more about Applied Social Sciences
Applied Social Sciences student Mae and alumnus Charlie will tell you what they enjoy most about the course, what skills they have learned and how it has helped develop their career.