Your professor is teaching a class on employability and the curriculum. Write a post responding to the professor's question. Express and support your opinion and contribute to the discussion in your own words. An effective response has at least 100 words.
Dr. Marta Oyelaran
Some universities now require every undergraduate to complete a period of work placement before graduating. Supporters argue that a placement teaches what no classroom can and that leaving it optional means it is taken up by the students who least need it. Critics reply that compulsory placements are unpaid more often than not, that their quality varies enormously, and that a requirement forces students into whatever placement they can find rather than one worth having. Should a placement be compulsory? Why?
Yusuf
Make it compulsory. The argument about quality is real and it is an argument for running the scheme properly, not for leaving it optional. When it is optional, the students who take it up already have contacts, already know how an office works, and gain the least; the ones who would gain most look at an unfamiliar process and decide it is not for them. Optional schemes reliably widen the gap they were meant to close.
Clara
Yusuf has described the problem accurately and drawn the wrong conclusion from it. If the barrier is that some students cannot navigate the process, the answer is to navigate it for them, not to compel everyone. A requirement changes what a bad placement means: at the moment a student in a useless placement can leave, and under a requirement they must stay in it to graduate, which hands a great deal of power to employers who are contributing nothing.