Year 11 students get back to business with a Day of Employability

Year 11 students went straight back to business on the first day of term with a Day of Employability, organised by Mrs Kate Mead, our Head of Careers and Future Skills, and Peter Buncombe from Form the Future. As the students enter their GCSE year, they will be working hard for their subjects and selecting their A Levels. This day provides an opportunity to zoom out from school life and reflect on their future careers.  

We were delighted to welcome local employers into the school to share their expertise with the students and help to prepare them for their next steps. The workshops spanned a range of practical skills, broadened students’ knowledge of options, from higher education to apprenticeships, and provided key advice for success, no matter what their chosen path.

In their event feedback forms:

98% of students said they would recommend this event to future students. 

The CV session, led by Rebecca Foster from G-Fresh, aimed to hone the students’ CV-writing skills. The students were introduced to the function, use and importance of this crucial document, often being ‘the key to a successful job search’, before the students filled in their own CV template, building on their practical skills. 

Students continued to hone and apply their employability skills during the interview skills workshop, run by Form the Future. During this session, students took part in mock-interviews with local employers. The questions were designed to capture real-life job interview experience, as students recounted examples of teamwork, times where they had to take responsibility or deal with a difficult situation, their strengths and weaknesses and proudest achievements.  The employers reported that they were so impressed with the students at interview that they would have offered many of them the job.

One student said of her opportunity for real interview experience from a real, local, employer:

‘I really enjoyed the positive feedback I received from the interviewers’

Rich Wainwright, from the Centre for Business Excellence, delivered a workshop on decision-making, covering a range of practical and motivational topics. The group discussed different types of learning, the impact of surroundings and peer groups on students, and how best to prioritise. At the end of the class, students reflected on what they found most valuable from the session, with many singling out the idea of ‘self-management’ - that prioritising is less about ‘time management’ than deciding how best to manage yourself and what you choose to do.  

Alan Boswell Group and Grant Thornton explained their apprenticeship programme and advised that apprenticeships can offer an alternative route to university which gives you the chance to develop both academically while developing excellent employability skills and getting paid a salary. We were delighted to welcome back a St Mary's alumna,  Amani Hajee, who is in her first year degree apprenticeship with Alan Boswell.

Julia Schumann-Pratt from NHS Cambridge University Hospitals explained there are over 350 careers in the NHS, both clinical and nonclinical, ranging from doctors, dentists, administrators, and managers. She discussed a variety of routes into the NHS including university or apprenticeships and went on to identify both the full range of clinical and nonclinical apprenticeships. 

The employers were impressed by the girls’ confidence, noting that the students were keen and enthusiastic, well-spoken, and engaged and the school should be very proud of them. 

The students were equally complimentary of their experience:

• ‘Really good and concise lessons - lots of useful information that I will take away with me’
• ‘I like details and information about apprenticeship the best’
• ‘I liked the decision making section the most because it was engaging & made me think about what steps I need to take for the future I want for myself’
• ‘I found this very helpful and I found the interview and CV best as they were interactive and allowed me to think and I got some very good feedback from my interview’
• ‘Loved the mock interview, interviewers were really engaging’.

They carry these skills and messages with them into the next years of their school lives and beyond.  

Find out more about careers at St Mary's