A personal career coach in every student's pocket for Western Sydney University

At a glance

• Built on: Laravel with a Next.js front end
• What it does: Story Bank, Personal Capacities Wheel, employer- and alumni-designed Playlists, mentor connections, shareable skills badges, personalised job recommendations
• Architecture: modular, tailoring the experience by study year and discipline, with permissioned pathways protecting alumni privacy
• Impact: Playlists adopted into some core curriculum; the foundation for Alumni Edge and Community Manager

The problem

Western Sydney University’s Employability and Careers team identified a widespread challenge: students too often navigate university feeling unsupported and unprepared for the workforce, lacking confidence in job applications and undervaluing their life experiences as employability assets. Their vision was a personal career coach in every student’s pocket.

Our approach

Shakewell proposed and built Western Edge — a centralised learning portal powered by AI and machine learning, custom-developed on Laravel and Next.js. Students record milestones in a Story Bank that feeds a Personal Capacities Wheel, follow learning Playlists co-designed with employers and alumni, connect with mentors, earn shareable skills badges and receive personalised job recommendations. A modular architecture tailors the experience by study year and discipline, with permissioned pathways protecting alumni privacy.

The outcome

Western Edge delivers transformation, not just content: Playlists have become part of some core curriculum, and the platform is the foundation for future Alumni Edge and Community Manager expansions.

“Michael and the team work in deep partnership and are genuinely invested in the success of the project and the maximising the impact it can deliver to end users. Always exceeding expectations, you will not find a more amiable, grounded and technically proficient team!”

— Kelly Whitney, WSU Associate Director; Careers, Talent & Organisational Success

Why a custom platform rather than an off-the-shelf LMS

The core of Western Edge is personalised logic, not content delivery: recommendations driven by what a student has recorded, a capacities model that updates as they add milestones, badges that are theirs to share, and permissioned pathways so alumni can be approached without exposing their details. No learning management system does that natively, which is why it sits on Laravel with a Next.js front end rather than inside a platform designed for courses.

Related services: Website Development, AI Consulting & Implementation

Industry: Education