Case study: Placements

Sometimes placements can be difficult to navigate, so here’s a story about what can go wrong and what you can do about it.

Many graduate students campuses are required to do placements as part of their degree. Placements are often a crucial part of the practical component to your studies, but they can come with challenges and not all placements are created equal. Read Mary’s story to learn more about what you can do when a placement goes wrong.

Case study: Maria

Mary is a graduate student at Monash. Since she’s studying allied health, her course has a compulsory placement component which she was excited about - she'd been doing well in her units and was more than ready for hands-on experience.

Unfortunately, from day one, she began having issues with her placement supervisor. This supervisor was difficult to communicate with, often failed to give Mary proper direction, and occasionally made rude remarks to her.

Although Mary felt uncomfortable around her supervisor, she still carried on and gave her very best each day of the placement. The next few days went relatively well and Mary was able to participate in the provision of the services offered by the placement provider. 

At the beginning of her second week of placement, Mary felt ill. She called in sick to the placement team and into work, explaining that she needed to take a few days off to recover. She didn’t speak directly with her supervisor, but a colleague assured her it was fine and that they would pass on the message. Yet when she was feeling better and ready to return to placement, she received an email informing her that she had been removed from the placement for unprofessional behaviour.

This was a total surprise to Mary. When she asked why she had been removed, she was told that her supervisor had claimed that Mary had failed to show up to placement without notifying anyone that she wouldn’t be able to make it. 

Mary was understandably very frustrated, as she insisted that she had followed proper protocols and made the placement team and her provider aware of her illness each day she was not in attendance. 

At a loss for what to do, Mary contacted the MGA advocacy service. An advocate advised her that since she was a student at MNHS, she would need to go through the ProFESS process. Then the advocate walked her through the steps required in going through this process in order to appeal to her faculty. 

This advice helped Mary to plead her case and explain the circumstances leading to this unfair removal. The University believed and accepted her explanation, offering her a free make-up placement, also meaning that Mary wouldn’t fail the unit. 

After all was said and done, Mary completed her placement successfully and avoided a fail grade on her transcript, thanks to some guidance from the MGA advocates.

If you find yourself facing a similar dilemma to Mary, get in touch with our advocacy service at mga-advocacy@monash.edu.