The Living CV: translating partnership experience into real world employability outcomes for students

Solent Student Partner Programme is a cross-institutional, co-creation initiative at Southampton Solent University in the UK. This paper discusses how we have used the principles of our institutional Living CV approach to support our Student Partners to translate their partnership experiences into work readiness.  The paper starts by providing a review of the literature on student partnership and employability. Next, it outlines the institutional context of the Solent Student Partnership Programme. It then moves on to describe the principles and practice of our ‘Living CV’ approach, before presenting outcomes and data to show how this has been used to help student partners get future ready.  We conclude the paper by arguing that there is a need for more proactive approaches to supporting the real-world employability outcomes of students who engage in university partnership work.