CDU Careers Centre team honoured with Excellence Awards

Charles Darwin University’s (CDU) Careers Centre has cause to celebrate after being awarded three Excellence Awards at the National Association of Graduate Careers Advisory Services (NAGCAS) Conference recently.

The annual conference, which was held in Sydney in November, brings together careers service professionals, industry associations and university graduate recruiters from around Australia to share best practice and support careers services and the career development of students.

CDU’s Career Centre Industry Consultant Tasfia Miti and Careers Centre Manager Liz Hendry both received Individual Excellence Awards while CDU’s AWEsome (Australian Workplace Experience) Program received an Excellence in Collaboration award.

Ms Hendry, who has been with CDU for over 12 years working in the careers space said the awards were a nice way to have the team’s hard work recognised.  

“It is wonderful for our team to be recognised with these awards, we all really love working in the careers service area assisting our students to develop employability skills and become more confident to achieve their goals,” Ms Hendry said. 

“It is a nice way to put CDU’s Career Centre on the map and show other universities and organisations what we do here at CDU.”

CDU’s AWEsome program provides international students with an opportunity to learn about the Australian workplace culture through a series of workshops followed by a 50-hour placement in a CDU work unit. So far, 35 students and 15 CDU teams have been part of the AWEsome program.

AWEsome Program coordinator and Career Centre Employability Programs Officer Caroline Thompson said the program has delivered tangible outcomes for students.

“Feedback from the program suggests that 91% of students now feel ‘fairly’ or ‘completely confident’ about entering an Australian workplace with 50% of students already having gained meaningful employment in a professional workplace,” Ms Thompson said.

“It is tremendous that this program has been recognised nationally and we look forward to expanding the program and providing more students with an opportunity to grow in confidence and develop their soft skills.”

Ms Miti and Ms Thompson were also a part of the NAGCAS conference organising committee and were able to attend the conference in Sydney after receiving a Vice-Chancellor’s Professional Development Scholarship.

“It was so good to be able to attend the conference and meet other Careers practitioners from around the country,” Ms Miti said.

“Thank you to CDU for helping us to make the CDU Careers Centre even better for our students.”