Learning and teaching through PACE: changing roles and environments

This paper reports on a study which explored the implications of new roles generated within WIL-activities through the interrelationships and interconnections of university teachers with other stakeholders. We identify important elements of the context within which participants perform unfamiliar roles and experience within the hitherto unknown environments of WIL. The concept of liminality, or “in-between-ness” is used to explore the processes of role transition in WIL. Students, when undertaking a placement, for example, are neither fully ‘professional’ nor fully ‘student-like’. And similarly university teachers and supervisors at external organisations play out a set of alternate identities that differ from their official job descriptions. None of the cohorts are either fully supported in or securely ascribed these roles, and the unsettled nature of this situation for all is argued to be both a key benefit and challenge of WIL. We conclude with some recommendations for improvement in supporting all stakeholders to maximise the potential benefits of undertaking new and unfamiliar roles.