HEQCO report examines student experiences with WIL during pandemic

A recent report by the Higher Education Quality Council of Ontario (HEQCO) examines student experiences of work-integrated learning during the 2020-21 academic year. Given the growing prevalence of online WIL, the researchers examined the experiences of students who participated in remote and hybrid experiences in the report. They found that remote WIL offered benefits such as flexibility for students and broader recruitment pools for employers, but it came with challenges such as difficulty networking and communicating. They also evaluated student experiences and rates of satisfaction through the lens of identity to better understand the experience of underrepresented groups. The researchers found statistically significant disparities in satisfaction between gender, disability status, and immigrant status groups. Looking to the future, the researchers call for system-wide data collection on WIL to support deeper analysis.