Deputy Mayor offers careers advice

Joanne McCartney, Statutory Deputy London Mayor for Education and Childcare, visited Kingsmead School in Enfield this week as part of an inspiring event for 150 Year Eight students organised by Reed in Partnership’s Young Careers service.

The Deputy Mayor gave a talk to the students before answering questions from the students on what inspired her, why she likes politics and what GCSEs and A-Levels she decided to take. The Deputy Mayor discussed the importance of developing soft skills as well as academic subjects.

Following the talk, she then joined a Careers Fair designed to support these students for career choices to go in conjunction with their chosen Subjects at their Year 9 Options Stage next year. The Careers Fair included stalls from the RAF, Royal Navy, Marriott Hotels, UKPN, TFL, Brunel Uni, Santander, London Fire Brigade, Hertford Regional College, North London Garages and MCP Catering. The employers were brought together by Reed in Partnership’s Career Engagement Managers Lillian Kalejaiye and Sunny Patel.

Our Young Careers service delivers high quality and comprehensive careers guidance by bringing groups of secondary schools together with employers to pilot ways of developing a high quality and comprehensive careers guidance strategy.

Our new Young Careers report found that very employers’ motivation for supporting schools’ careers provision is different, but doing so is a “no-brainer” in the words of one employer. Employers cited some of the key reasons in getting involved as an increased workforce diversity, improving social mobility and developing the skills pipeline.

Martin Fallon, Managing Director of Reed in Partnership said:

“It was fantastic to see the service in action today with an inspiring talk from London’s Deputy Mayor, followed by a varied range of employers at our Careers Fair for the students. This event summed up what we strive to deliver for the young people we support through this service: innovative careers guidance and activities.”

Students attending the event found it useful and inspiring. One commented:

“I had a lot of fun on careers day. I found out about how many more jobs there are that we haven’t thought about that are actually really interesting.”

Another said: “I liked being with the navy and using good teamwork and communications skills to do a task.”

Hannah Vincent, Aim Higher Mentor at Kingsmead School commented: “It was fantastic to see careers engagement between employers and our year 8 students. We value our connections with employers and keeping the conversation around careers in young people alive.”

The Young Careers Report 2018 findings

Every employers’ motivation for supporting schools’ careers provision is different, but doing so is a “no-brainer” in the words of one employer. We found:

• Employers cited some of the key reasons in getting involved as an increased workforce diversity, improving social mobility and developing the skills pipeline.
• Most employers are keen to improve young people’s understanding of the career options in their sector and challenge misconceptions.

The Young Careers pilot is co-funded by the Education and Skills Funding Agency and the European Social Fund.