Skills Award

Skills Award will help you to:

• Develop your skills: By getting involved in Students’ Union activities and taking part in the Skills Award training, you will develop transferable skills such as leadership and communication.
• Recognition of your skills: All Skills Award completers get formal recognition from the University and the Students’ Union.
• Present your skills: You will learn how to present your skills to employers in CVs, applications and interviews.

The first step of Skills Award is to take on a role of responsibility in the Students’ Union. You can do this in a lot of different ways. Some roles require a small time commitment whilst others require a larger time commitment.

Here’s the full list of eligible roles:

• Committee Members for a society, sports club or Raise and Give
• Heads of Media and Section Heads for Student Media
• Course Representatives
• Students’ Union Crew and Help Squad
• Community Volunteers (including one-off volunteers, volunteering groups and Community Foundation leaders)
• Members of Student Council and BLSA Board Members
• Student Trustee
• Student Staff employed by the Students’ Union (if you’re getting paid by the Students’ Union, you fall into this category)

If you don’t currently hold a role of responsibility in the Students’ Union, you can still register to engage with our training offer. In order to complete the award, you will eventually need to take on one of these roles. This will enable you maximise your skill development and give you an opportunity to apply your skills. Luckily, it’s easy to get involved, we recommend trying our one-off volunteering opportunities. When you’ve volunteered, you just need to log your hours, and then you can sign-up for Skills Award. Learn more on our Volunteering pages.

If you already hold a role of responsibility in the Students’ Union, you’re ready to register for the Skills Award. You just need to complete a short registration form. The registration for 2021/22 is now open and will close on 1st March 2022.

Once you’ve completed the registration form, the Employability Team will be in touch with more information. You will receive access to the training calendar so that you can begin to book your training sessions.

After completing any compulsory training for your role, Skills Award training sessions and a reflection session, you will get the Skills Award!

Award	Role-specific Training	Skills Award Training*	Reflection Session
Bronze	✓	1	✓
Silver	✓	2	✓
Gold	✓	3	✓

*The Skills Award Training offer includes LinkedIn Learning courses. Please note that in order for LinkedIn Learning courses to count towards the Skills Award, it must relate to developing your employability skills and be at least 1 hour in duration.

We know that Skills Award participants all have different interests and career plans, so we organise a varied programme of training sessions to suit your needs.

Examples of training sessions include: Public speaking, time management, negotiation, first aid, mental health awareness, volunteer management and leadership. Please note that some sessions are only offered once per academic year, so sign up early to avoid disappointment.

Any compulsory role-specific training (e.g. Societies training) is required to get the Skills Award. You will need to tell us which training you have taken part in and we will verify with the relevant member of staff.

We’d love to hear from you if you have an idea for a new type of training we should organise. You can contact us at: su-employability@qmul.ac.uk.

Yes, you will receive a certificate for completing the bronze, silver and gold stages of the award. If you complete the gold award with over 10 hours of unpaid training, you will also get recognition of your Skills Award on your electronic transcript (called HEAR) from the university.