Waterloo Experience (WE) Accelerate: An innovative way to access student talent this winter!

Four co-op students chatting

We know from recent research done with over 74,000 work-term job descriptions that employers across all industries are looking for students with digital skills to help transition the way they do business. That’s why we’re offering our innovative Waterloo Experience (WE) Accelerate program – to give you more ways to connect with our tech-savvy students who can help fill your talent needs!  

WE Accelerate is a robust alternative to a traditional co-op work term for first work-term students. The program combines future-ready, in-demand skill development content (co-created with industry collaborators) with team-based project experience and employability development content.

If you don’t have the capacity to hire a student for a traditional 8- to 16-week work term, this is a great way to harness our students’ bright minds for shorter projects.

This fall, students will be enrolling in WE Accelerate skill streams and accessing skill development content provided by our industry collaborators. Here's a look at what students will be learning:

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Stream Skills students will develop Typical projects students will complete
Digital Bootcamp

  • Design responsive websites for both desktop and mobile platforms

  • Develop and implement SEO strategies to improve search visibility

  • Create content and execute digital marketing campaigns through email and video

  • Utilize office productivity software effectively (optional)

  • Enhance a company’s digital presence and online engagement

  • Optimize a website’s user interface (UI), user experience (UX), and accessibility

  • Create an SEO strategy to attract new audiences and boost digital marketing efforts


 
Azure & Artificial Intelligence
  • Understand and hold certification in Microsoft Azure Fundamentals
  • Build a foundation and hold  certification in Microsoft Azure AI Fundamentals
  • Apply Design Thinking principles to problem-solving

  • Leverage Azure and AI to develop solutions for real-world challenges

  • Identify critical challenges in accessibility, financial services, and healthcare, and propose tech-driven solutions

  • Present innovative solutions to peers and industry experts, detailing the journey from concept to implementation
Creating accessible digital learning environments 

  • Enhance course components and training materials within the D2L Brightspace learning management system (LMS)

  • Apply universal design for learning (UDL) principles in diverse learning environments

  • Understand norms and standards related to accessibility

  • Enhance the accessibility of educational and training materials

  • Align documents, tools, and media in educational content with accessibility standards

  • Develop resources to guide the creation of accessible educational and training materials
Data-driven solutions for global challenges   

  • Use sustainability as a guiding framework to inform decisions and recommendations 

  • Identify, sort, categorize, clean, compare, aggregate and translate data effectively 

  • Analyze and evaluate the quality of data sets and sources (data literacy) 

  • Use data analysis tools proficiently, including Excel and PowerBI (among others) 
  • Compile and compare organizational and external data 

  • Analyze data to interpret meaning and determine the significance of data sources 

  • Provide reports, visualizations, and recommend solutions to organizational challenges using data


 

Do you have projects that require digital expertise?

We are seeking projects from employers that align with the skills above to help our students apply what they’ve learned. Each project will be assigned a team of approximately five students who will help tackle the problem your organization has provided across a 5-week span from March 3 - April 4 and should involve approximately 120 hours of work per student (approximately 25 hours per week). We also encourage you to explore taking on multiple teams of students to work on the same deliverable. It presents a great opportunity to investigate different avenues to the project you have in mind.

In return, we ask that you guide the students through your project, provide them with feedback and assess their performance at the end of the project to help them keep learning. We also encourage participating employers to provide a small award for each student's work on their projects, if possible.

By taking part in this offering, you’re not only gaining our students’ digital skills and cross-disciplinary creativity on the projects you provide – you’re also investing in student talent to help the next generation of graduates prepare for the future workforce!

Timeline and what to expect

WE Accelerate work term begins January 27
Career programming (part 1) January 27 - 31
  • Complete onboarding and career curriculum (part 1).
  • Approximately 25 hours during this first week, with approximately 10 additional hours of career programming to occur throughout.
  • 1 hour of synchronous content daily, with all other content provided asynchronously.
Skill development programming Beginning February 3
  • Complete skill development content provided by industry collaborator(s).
  • Approximately 100 hours, with varying degrees of synchronous content depending on the stream.
Project experience March 3 - April 4 (exact timing will depend on the stream/project)
  • Complete industry collaborator projects in teams and receive feedback.
  • Approximately 120 hours of project work to be expected across 5 weeks (all projects to be completed by April 4).
  • Please note: the hours to complete your project work will be determined by the project provider, with the expectation you are available.
  • Industry collaborators will complete a Project Evaluation Form and assign individual ratings OR an overall rating for each project team (up to the employers discretion).
  • Project evaluation form deadline (for employers): Friday, April 11.
Career programming (part 2) April 7 - 11
  • Complete career curriculum (part 2) and final summative assignment (due April 11).
  • Approximately 25 hours.

Questions?

If you have questions or a project that can use some digital expertise this winter, connect with your Account Manager to learn more about WE Accelerate and how to take part!

New to hiring?

If you haven't hired with us before, you can contact hire.talent@uwaterloo.ca and a Business Developer will reach out to answer your questions.