Category: Careers

Impact on pupils

Throughout Years 9, 10 and 11 students are placed in targeted careers talks with speakers carefully matched to student interest areas in order to enable HVS students to make the best possible decisions about their future careers.

 

HVS partners with Enterprise M3 and The Careers and Enterprise Company to constantly evaluate the impact of our careers programme on pupils. Further, we routinely assess the impact of individual sessions or interventions on students and, where appropriate, adjust accordingly. We ensure that by Christmas of Year 11 every student has had a one-to-one careers guidance session with a specialist careers advisor, and then identify students that may require further support and work closely with them to try to ensure the best possible outcome.

 

We also work closely with local colleges and other post-16 education providers to track the destinations of all of our students, and again put measures in place to identify students that may be at risk of not entering education, employment or training in order to put interventions in place.

 

Y11 Intended Destinations – Summer 2023

Careers Information

Designated Careers Lead: Mr W Inglis
Email: inglisw@hoevalleyschool.org
Tel: 01483 662627

Careers Plan 2023-2024
Provider Access Policy Statement
Work Ready Policy
Work Ready Bulletin
Unifrog

The Work Ready agenda is central to life at Hoe Valley School, and through it we aim to meet or exceed the Gatsby Charitable Foundation’s Benchmarks of Good Careers Guidance. We see these benchmarks as a starting point for our Work Ready programme, but can confirm that: 

  • Our careers programme is stable, but agile enough to respond to changes in labour market conditions.
  • Students are regularly exposed to the latest Labour Market Information in curriculum lessons, in stand-alone careers sessions and in assemblies.
  • Led by an experienced teacher, the Work Ready programme is personalised to the needs of each student.
  • The Work Ready skills are embedded in every subject, and curriculum learning includes a focus on the workplace application of each subject.
  • Local employers and employees are regularly invited into the school to talk to students, and even to conduct mock interviews.
  • We aim to offer all students meaningful experiences of the workplace, through regular visits to employers.
  • Further and higher education providers are regularly invited into the school to meet students, and we encourage all students to visit further and higher education providers..
  • As they prepare to move into post-16 education, all students receive at least one hour-long careers guidance session with an independent advisor from Innervate Careers.

The careers plan is reviewed every year ready for the start of the new academic year and will evolve over time as the jobs market changes.

The Gatsby Benchmarks are:

  1. A stable careers programme
  2. Learning from career and labour market information
  3. Addressing the needs of each pupil
  4. Linking curriculum learning to careers
  5. Encounters with employers and employees
  6. Experiences of workplaces
  7. Encounters with further and higher education
  8. Personal guidance

Work Ready

The Work Ready programme runs through the entire curriculum at Hoe Valley School.

Beyond academic success, our students leave us with skills transferable to any walk of life and fully equipped to enter the 21st-century workplace. From Year 7 onwards, we focus on the importance of communications technologies, we foster creativity, adaptability and time management. Later in their time at Hoe Valley School, students meet employers, discover the options available after the age of 16 and visit appropriate workplaces.

At the heart of this are links with universities, industry experts and different places of work, with students undertaking ‘real world’ projects in the fields of Robotics and Digital Learning. This focus on Work Ready skills sees the latest technology used routinely in teaching and learning, with students using their school-issued Chromebooks to complete tasks that would once have been slower and less effective. 

Beyond this, though, the Work Ready ethic pervades all areas of school life, with for example professional sound and lighting equipment used in school plays, the latest digital cameras enabling students to transport themselves into their learning thanks to our chromakey video wall, and an online library making reading for pleasure easy to access at home.

Combining curriculum learning with the Work Ready Skills ensures that by the time students leave HVS they are well prepared to excel in their chosen field.

The Work Ready Skills that underpin this all are:

Adaptability Able to quickly adapt to working in new and efficient ways in an ever-changing work environment
Creativity Imaginative and innovative in creating something new and effective
Time Management Excellent at planning how much time to spend on specific activities and able to meet a deadline
Persuasive Communication Able to argue, convince or persuade someone to accept a desired way of thinking
Teamwork Thrives on working collaboratively to achieve a common goal
Digital Skills Advanced knowledge of modern technology for the workplace

 

Impact

Hoe Valley School is rightly proud of our Work Ready programme, with a strong track record in placing students in the most appropriate possible post-16 education, employment or training achieved partly through out insistence that every single student spends time to discuss their options with a qualified independent careers advisor from our partners Innervate Careers. Internally, we constantly evaluate the impact of the Work Ready programme through surveys, student voice and by analysing the success rate in placing leavers into whatever they may do next. Hoe Valley School is a leading member of Local Enterprise Partnership EM3, and we work closely with our Enterprise Coordinator and outside Enterprise Advisor to audit our performance against the Gatsby Benchmarks. We have taken innovative steps to integrate the Work Ready skills into the curriculum, and this aspect of the programme is currently the subject of University led research through the University of Roehampton. Pending the result of this research, we intend to become regional leaders in this key area, sharing best practice with other schools and colleges.

Y11 Intended Destinations – Summer 2023

Please click here to read our latest Work Ready Bulletin. This contains a host of useful information about the latest careers opportunities for Hoe Valley School students.