We ask candidates to select ‘full time’ or ‘part time’ for their work history entries.
Some providers say that ‘part time’ doesn’t give enough detail. It could mean a candidate has worked 5 hours or 25 hours, for example.
User needs
Listen to a discussion about full time and part time with a candidate
Hypotheses
Context
UCAS asks for working hours for all jobs. We’re not sure if this is necessary, because:
- the difference between 20 and 22 hours, for example, isn’t significant
- a full time job shows a level of commitment, whether it was 37 hours or 40 hours
Our hypotheses
If we ask for the working pattern (rather than the number of hours):
-
Then it will be easier for candidates to fill out the application form
Because they won’t have to find out the number of hours they worked in each job -
Then providers will still have the information they need to make decisions on a candidate’s application
Because the working pattern will give a detailed picture of a candidate’s work history
How will we know this works?
We’ll know this works when candidates can describe their part time jobs in a way that’s useful for providers.
We’ve updated the design (refer to screenshots below) to include a field for candidates to enter their working pattern. We’ll see if this works by:
- testing it with candidates to see if they understand what kind of information to give
- testing it with teacher training providers to see if this gives them the information they need
Findings
Candidates are frequently completing this, and typically give hours per week as in the example. They have also used the free text fields to indicate zero hour contract details and similar situations.
Working pattern for a part time job#
Work history review page#
