Skills and Advice session FAQs

You can book onto skills and advice sessions by logging into your Handshake account. You will find the sessions listed here under Handshake events. We look forward to seeing you there!  

We run each skills and advice session at least once per term.  

Skills and advice sessions run both in-person at the Streatham and Penryn campuses and also online.  

While a majority of our sessions take place during term time, we do run some sessions online throughout the Easter break and up until August.   

We run over twenty different workshops and webinars covering a vast range of topics outlined here. Skills and advice sessions aim to help you increase your confidence and competence in key employability skills and prepare effectively for the graduate job market. 

We think group work can be a very powerful learning tool, but appreciate this isn’t the right approach for everyone, and we work to include alternative ways of engaging with particular tasks and activities. 

You can find the joining link in the event overview on Handshake. You can also find the joining link in the automatic email you will have received on signing up for the event. If you haven’t received this email, it might be because you have unsubscribed from Handshake emails. You can find information about managing your Handshake notification preferences here: Handshake | Career Zone | University of Exeter 

We endeavour to make all our skills and advice sessions as accessible as possible and details about our approach to teaching and learning can be found here. On registering for a skills or advice session, you will be prompted to complete a survey advising us of any accessibility requirements you have. This survey will be reviewed up to 24 hours ahead of a workshop taking place. If we're unable to make adjustments within this time frame, we'll be in touch with you directly.  

This depends on the session. For some hour-long advice sessions, cameras and mics are not necessary but you may be asked to engage through the Teams chat. For some skills workshops, you will benefit most from the session if you are able to participate and share your experiences with your fellow students with your mics and cameras enabled. In the event description for each session, we will outline expectations surrounding the use of cameras and microphones.  

These things happen, and we will try to resolve any issues in the session where we can. You can also direct message or email the workshop host to let them know of the issues you have if possible. If you are unable to maintain connection for the whole session or a good proportion of the session, we would recommend leaving the workshop and re-booking. 

The workshop host receives an attendance record from the session, showing who joined and at what time. If you attended for the full session or a good proportion of the session, we use the record to confirm check in manually, meaning you don’t need to do anything. But if you have any concerns, please email the workshop host. 

Your attendance will have marked by the workshop host. In most cases this can take up to 48 hours to update for the Exeter Award. However, if you didn’t attend the full session or a good proportion of it then you will have been marked as absent from the session and will need to book onto another one.  

If you can no longer attend a session, please cancel your booking via the Handshake event. If you are cancelling within 24 hours of the event, then please contact the Career Zone by emailing careers@exeter.ac.uk. Accurate session numbers mean staff can plan effectively and decide if we need to amend the activities and format of the session, so it's really important we know whether or not you will be attending.    

Many skills and advice sessions count towards the Exeter Award and Exeter Leaders Award. You can find specific information about which sessions count towards the awards here: Personal and Professional Development | Career Zone | University of Exeter 

No, you don’t have to be signed up to either award to attend skills and advice sessions. However, if you would like to know more about the Exeter Award or Exeter Leaders Award, you can find more information here: Overview of schemes | Career Zone | University of Exeter 

Generally, sessions are listed at the start of term, so if you can’t see your session on Handshake chances are it will come around again! If you are in a position where you need the session for your Exeter Leaders Award (e.g. Managing People or Leadership Skills) and you are in your final term, please contact exeteraward@exeter.ac.uk who can advise you on next steps, or add you to a mailing list for when those sessions are listed.