On Wednesday 4th March 2020 we welcomed some local employers into the school to launch our Inaugural Careers morning during National Careers week.
We had spent a week introducing the idea to the students and all students through Years 7-11 were invited to attend. We were ready!
Representatives from Herbert Parkinson Ltd, B&G Sears Construction, Cotton Town Bikes, the Army, Inspira, The Hive Business Network. Primary Dance UK, The Ambulance Service and the EPT were represented.
All of our students were given a chance to visit each company and find out about the life of employees there and the types of jobs available.
Each employer spent 15 minutes with each of our Year Groups to give them a brief introduction to the business and also to allow our students to ask any questions that they may have.
We ensured that our students were in small groups of 5 or less to provide this opportunity and also to enable them to increase their self-confidence and self-esteem by being able to ask questions is a safe and judgement free environment.
Outcomes:
Some of our students had ideas of future careers prior to this event but some did not.
Teacher feedback from accompanying their pupils included:
“I was so impressed with M today. He was so polite to all out guests but especially the Army.
He went over to shake his hand and introduced himself. He asked very sensible questions. Questions that he had obviously been thinking of for quite some time.
He engaged with him all through lunch still asking very interesting questions. Shook his hand when he left. I told M today of his induction night with the Cadets and he was delighted. He said ‘at last my life is all falling into place’.
He was also the same with the man from B&G. The man really engaged with the pupils.”
Next Steps:
Eden will continue its comprehensive Careers programme following the guidance that the more exposure to Careers and opportunities. The DfE Guidance asks Secondary schools educators to offer each pupil an annual encounter with an Employer. At Eden we believe that is not enough and some of our Year 7 pupils have already had more than that. We will continue our approach to Inspire our students to want to make positive transitions after the leave Eden School.
The Future:
All of Eden’s previous students have left into EET opportunities. Our challenges this Year will be a little more difficult with the COVID Outbreak, but nevertheless opportunities have been sourced for all of our Year 11 Leavers and we are continuing to support them in different ways to make transitions successful.
Next Event:
Our next Careers day has already seen several employers wishing to return and word of mouth has also offered us some exciting future companies to work with. This will be an annual event and will occur next March.. In between we will continue to visit and work with other partners such as The Marriott Hotel, Warburtons, The Eric Wright Group, The Life Centre amongst others who continue to offer amazing opportunities to our students.
