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Communications
The goal of Career Services’ and Co-operative Education’s communications is to increase awareness amongst students, employers, and the Carleton community about the services, programming, and events these departments have to offer. Over the past year, there has been increased use of project management tools, new social media strategies to inform and engage students, and a return to strategic print marketing materials. In terms of the online presence of these two departments, this is comprised of two student-facing websites, one employer-facing website, an employment portal, and active involvement on three social media platforms – all designed to connect students, alumni, and employers with support and opportunities.
Project Management
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From May 1, 2022, to April 30, 2023, 160 projects were submitted by the Career Services and Co-op teams. These projects allow Career Services and Co-op to promote events, programs, services, and more with deliverables that include (but are not limited to), social media posts/campaigns, email marketing, event calendar and newsletter posts, videos, onepagers, and ads.
Along with the continued use of Trello (a Kanban-style project management tool that helps organize tasks, manage projects, and increase collaboration), the Communications team expanded its use of Notion. This productivity application allows the team to manage its daily and monthly social media schedule, as well as create date-specific communications plans.
Using the calendar function in Notion, the Communications team created new calendars for the Employer and Student Dashboards, LCD schedule, email campaign calendar, and newsletter schedule. This allowed for a bird’s-eye-view of the term and for the content in each calendar to be organized in a way that is both balanced and strategic.
Career Services Job Board
Career Services invites employers in all industries and locations to post employment opportunities on its online job board, hosted within the mySuccess/CUHire portal. This year, the team implemented several strategies to increase job postings, including reminding Career Fair employers to post
Fall 2022:
Views of online job postings by term:
Winter 2023:
37,300
62,935 prior to the fair; connecting with current employer partners to remind them about, and support them in, posting to CUHire; and researching currently-hiring Ottawa-based employers to increase their awareness about the Job Board.
Career Services recorded a total of 18,120 positions throughout the 2022-2023 academic year. This represents a 120% increase in number of positions posted with Career Services compared to the previous academic year.
Website Analytics
Career Services Website (carleton.ca/career)
Throughout the 2022-2023 academic year, 79,454 users visited the Career Services website. This is an 11% increase from the previous year. The most visited webpage on the site, apart from the homepage, was the mySuccess webpage (/career/mysuccess/) with 17,064 pageviews. The homepage had 27,767 pageviews in the academic year. This is a 9% increase from the previous year.
Co-op Website (carleton.ca/co-op)
A total of 67,810 users visited the Co-op website from May 1, 2022, to April 30, 2023. This is an increase of 6% from the previous year. The most visited webpage on the site was the Co-op Participation Agreement page (/co-op/rulesregulations/co-op-participation-agreement/) with 8,247 pageviews. The homepage had 23,355 pageviews in the academic year. This represents a 36% decrease from the previous academic year.
Employers Website (carleton.ca/employers)
A total of 22,050 users visited the Employers website from May 1, 2022, to April 30, 2023. This is a 7% decrease from the previous academic year. The most visited webpage on the site was the Salary Survey page (/employers/hire-coop/i-hired-a-co-op-student/co-op-salary-survey) with 9,309 pageviews. The homepage had 12,728 pageviews in the academic year. This is a 5% decrease from the previous year.
Live Chat
Career Services allows users who visit the Career website to have quick, career-related questions answered through the Chatbot system. The Chatbot is monitored by a member of the Career Advising team during regular business hours, Monday to Friday, 8:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. The automated Chatbot system, launched in March 2023, now provides information to students and alumni 24/7. The Co-op program also launched a Chatbot in March. The Live Chat feature was used over 500 times throughout the 2022-2023 academic year.
MYSUCCESS/CUHIRE PORTAL
A total of 22,882 students logged in to the mySuccess portal from May 1, 2022, to April 30, 2023. A total of 2,814 employers logged in to the CUHire portal from May 1, 2022, to April 30, 2023.
Cuportfolio
cuPortfolio is Carleton University’s electronic portfolio system, a student-centred learning tool that provides a venue for students to collect and showcase academic and co-curricular artifacts, such as assignments, projects, videos, blogs, etc. It allows students to engage in reflective learning as they make connections between artifacts, experiences, and accomplishments.
cuPortfolio can be shared with peers, professors, and potential employers both to demonstrate students’ learning processes and to provide concrete evidence that they have met specific course learning outcomes or have the required work experience for certain career or academic opportunities.
A total of 3,384 students used cuPortfolio throughout 20222023. This is a 4% decrease in the number of student users compared to the previous academic year.
The number of classes using cuPortfolio for coursework was 72 in 2022-2023. This is on par with the previous academic year.
“I have been using cuPortfolio in many of my classes for several years now, and I find it a great benefit to students. As a reflection tool, they have the option of commenting on the work they are doing and the learning they are engaging in a more relaxed environment. This gives them the opportunity to really consider the value of each assignment as well as the chance to see their progress across the term. In addition, it gives me the chance to see what is working well for them and flags areas that could be adjusted to better suit their needs.”
-Janne Cleveland, Drama Studies
Social Media
Career Services and Co-op’s Instagram account gained 306 new followers, bringing the account’s total following up to 3,065. This represents an 11% growth.
Career Services and Co-op’s LinkedIn page gained 842 new followers, bringing the page’s total following up to 4,324. This represents a 24% growth.
Career Services and Co-op’s Twitter account lost 50 followers, bringing the account’s total following to 3,046. This represents a 2% decrease. For Career Services and Co-op, Twitter is the least popular of the three platforms with students. However, the Communications team still sees it as a useful tool for sharing posts from other Carleton faculties and departments that relate to career content, and for highlighting Career Services and Co-op’s content to those faculties and departments.
New Communications Initiatives
In the past 12 months, the Communications team has collaborated with Career Services and Co-op staff on several initiatives to expand students’ and employers’ awareness and knowledge of the events and programs offered.
Highlights from 2022-2023
The “#WeveGotYouCovered” toque campaign on LinkedIn. Co-op team members visited several employer partners in February 2023 to discuss summer recruitment plans, and employers received Co-op-branded toques along with the message, “We have you covered not only for recruitment, but also for the cold days ahead!” The photos of these visits and accompanying tags were highly popular, with impressions ranging from 1,600-6,600. Additionally, the posts were the account’s most-liked content for the duration of the campaign.
Peer-to-peer Instagram Reels. This involved videos from one of the Career Coaches (a co-op student) who would share tips on career competencies and employability skills. This also included an ongoing “Sunday Fun Day” series in which co-op students promote events, services, and programs using current social media trends. Views on these Reels range from 1,200-3,000 impressions.
Using Twitter threads and tagging Carleton departments to increase engagement on the weekly Upcoming Information Sessions series. Impressions range from 575-2,600, awarding these posts placement in the Career Services and Co-op Top Five Tweets each month.
New ways of using Instagram stories. This included a Career Services Job Board quiz, student testimonials, and alerts about Career Services booths on campus (many staff members who were working the booths had students show up to the booths because they saw the story on Instagram that day).
The creation of Social Media Cards that can be distributed during student meetings, booths at events, and at front desks. These cards list the handles and an overview of the content that can be found on the Career Services and Coop accounts, making it easy to find and follow the account on each platform.
A bulletin board installation in front of the Career Services office at 401 Tory. One of the communication goals of this year has been to expand people’s knowledge of what Career Services offers to students and alumni – that in addition to resume and interview support, Career Services also provides international internships, support for students with disabilities, employer info and recruitment sessions, career fairs, job postings, and workshops. Additionally, two smaller boards with the same information were created to replace outdated content on boards located on the third floor of Tory and in front of the cafeteria in Nideyinàn (formerly University Centre).
Ensuring Carleton’s new branding was applied to all new materials and reorders. This was particularly important as there was an increase in print-marketing materials postpandemic.
The Career Services Job Board communications plan. This had a soft launch in summer 2022 followed by a comprehensive roll-out in fall and winter 2022-2023. The goal of this plan was to increase student, alumni, and employer awareness of the Career Services Job Board (which is exclusive to the Carleton community) and benefits of accessing it.
Increased use of the Employer Dashboard, building on the success of the Student Dashboard in Orbis as a popular tool to highlight news and events. This included creating a form for Career Services and Co-op team members to request content and devising a year-long schedule based on the submitted requests.
