The Centre for Work-Integrated Learning (WIL)
We design work-integrated learning (WIL) curriculum that enhances student learning before, during, and after WIL experiences and encourages the development of future-ready skills. As WIL practitioners, we deliver academic courses and programs that are complemented by hands-on work experiences inside and outside of Waterloo’s co-operative education program.
We design and deliver WIL curriculum for undergraduate students in co-op and non co-op programs, and as of 2022 we’ve begun designing and delivering WIL curriculum in support of the University’s commitment to provide all graduate students the opportunity to participate in WIL. Our current offerings include:
- Professional Development (PD) courses
- EDGE experiential education certificate
- WE Accelerate program
- Digital skills fundamentals micro-courses
We collaborate with on-campus partners to design and deliver courses and programs that advance the University’s goals, reputation, innovation, WIL leadership and industry engagement.
The Centre for Work-Integrated Learning officially holds a Platinum designation with Waterloo’s Green Office program.
What is WIL?
Work-integrated learning (WIL) is a model and process of curricular experiential education which formally and intentionally integrates a student’s academic studies within a workplace or practice setting.
WIL experiences include an engaged partnership of at least these three components:
- an academic institution
- a host organization
- a student
WIL can occur at the course or program level and includes the development of learning outcomes related to employability, personal agency and life-long learning (CEWIL Canada, 2018).
Instructors use WIL to create meaningful learning experiences for Waterloo students through engagement with industry or community partners. Students can complete coursework and/or program requirements while simultaneously making meaningful contributions within organizations.
WIL involves collaboration between Waterloo instructors and the organizations students partner with to enhance students learning and the development of future-ready skills.
Discover types of WIL
*All definitions are based on Co-operative Education and Work-Integrated Learning Canada (CEWIL Canada)
Co-op students alternate study terms with work terms. They graduate with up to two years of relevant, paid work experience.
Internships typically include a full-time, discipline-specific placement that may be supervised, structured, paid or unpaid. They may occur midway through an academic program or once coursework is completed prior to graduation.
Involves work experience under the supervision of an experienced registered or licensed professional in any discipline that requires practice-based work experience for professional license or certification.
Students participating in applied research projects solve workplace problems in partnership with community organizations or industry. Solutions to these problems are typically generated through consulting, design, community-based research, or some combination of all three.
In field placements, students gain intensive, part-time/short-term, hands-on, practical experience in a setting relevant to their subject of study. Field placements may not require the supervision of a registered or licensed professional, and the completed work experience hours are not required for professional certification.
Intersperses one or two work terms (typically full-time) into an academic program, where work terms provide experience in a workplace setting related to the student’s field of study and/or career goals.
Service learning integrates meaningful community service with classroom instruction and critical reflection to enrich the learning experience and strengthen communities. In practice, students work in partnership with a community-based organization to apply their disciplinary knowledge to a challenge identified by the community.
Allows a student to leverage resources, space, mentorship and/or funding to engage in the early-stage development of business start-ups and/or to advance external ideas that address real-world needs for academic credit.
An agreement between a person who wants to learn a skill and an employer who needs a skilled worker. The employer is also willing to sponsor the apprentice and provide paid related practical experience under the direction of a certified journeyperson in a work environment conducive to learning the tasks, activities and functions of a skilled worker.
How we create quality WIL curriculum
Our WIL curriculum team is comprised of teaching and learning experts that rely on research and industry best practices to co-construct it with faculty members, industry partners, students and other WIL and/or teaching experts. Our work, guided by the P.E.A.R quality WIL framework, ensures that Waterloo students have opportunities to engage in substantive critical reflection and make meaningful connections between their WIL and academic experiences.
- We provide opportunities for learners to experience, reflect, theorize and apply new learning in a developmental environment by designing with the concept of productive failure in mind
- We design assessments and activities that enable learners to develop lifelong learning skills while applying new concepts in a workplace or practice setting.
A core tenet of our approach to designing and developing WIL curriculum is to co-create alongside experts and stakeholders. This highly collaborative approach to WIL curriculum development allows for a continuous feedback loop so we can further improve our WIL curriculum and align it with student needs, industry trends, faculty/program requirements and emerging instructional tools and educational technologies.
Recent examples of WIL curriculum co-creation
Throughout the development of PD 12: Critical Reflection for Growth in the Workplace, we worked with a student advisory group comprised of seven undergraduate co-op students from the faculties of arts, environment, and health. The students provided us with feedback on all aspects of the course content from the lens of their own experiences as Waterloo co-op students. Their critiques and recommendations were invaluable to the content development process and their insightful suggestions are woven throughout the course.
Our WIL Curriculum team engaged several industry and community partners in the creation of the graduate course WIL 601: Career Foundations for Work-Integrated Learning. This course is designed to allow Waterloo graduate students to explore their career goals and make effective plans to achieve those goals over the course of their graduate WIL experiences. Working alongside industry and community partners was essential to developing content that bridges the gap between theory and practice.
Offered in spring 2023, PS 699: Consulting Experience was a co-designed community and industry research course available to all graduate students. We worked closely with a faculty member to design the course structure, content, and assessments and delivered a course that gave graduate students meaningful consulting experience with industry partners. This partnership with faculty provided increased opportunities for student engagement and enhanced their experience working with industry partners while mitigating the often-added workload of leveraging WIL as a classroom pedagogy.
Our history
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2002
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The University of Waterloo grants academic credit for work terms. This necessitates the creation of a complementary co-op curriculum, one that will help address employer needs by developing students’ professional (or “soft”) skills.
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- 2006
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2007
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Two new Professional Development courses added.
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2008
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Another four additional Professional Development courses added and three additional faculties (Applied Health Sciences, Environment, and Science) join the program.
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2011
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The Faculty of Engineering joins and PD course enrolment nearly doubles. The department launches several new courses while redeveloping and refining its existing courses.
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- 2017
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2019
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The Waterloo Professional Development program department officially becomes known as Work-Integrated Learning (WIL) Programs.
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- 2021
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2022
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In collaboration with our partners in Co-operative and Experiential Education (CEE) and Graduate Studies and Postdoctoral Affairs (GSPA), we begin designing curriculum for WIL experiences at the graduate level.
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2023
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WIL Programs officially becomes Centre for Work-Integrated Learning (WIL) to better reflect the portfolio and expansion of the department's mandate to also help faculty, staff, employers, practitioners, and non-traditional learners benefit from WIL.
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