Norwood School is a forward thinking school; optimistic and ambitious for all. The outstanding achievement of pupils is testament to this. We achieve this by our commitment to a personalised approach and focus on the individual. We want The Norwood School to have access to high-quality and trained careers leaders, to oversee the delivery of school career and employability plans, manage links with employers, universities and independent career advisers and ensure that employability is built into school life.

All staff have an important part to play in maintaining and developing our Careers Guidance Provision.

Head of Faculty – Middle Leaders: It is the responsibility of each Head of Faculty across the curriculum to ensure that curriculum pathways include reference to career learning opportunities and links to the world of work. ‘This role acts as a bridge between external specialists, local employers and the school. The role holder is responsible for coordinating activities with externals, including work experience and ‘beside’ curriculum projects. They support the tutorial and teaching careers roles of their colleagues: providing training in up-to-date labour market information or knowledge about qualifications, as well as providing pedagogical support to colleagues in developing the ‘work ready’ capabilities.’

Subject teachers:  ‘Teachers are first and foremost subject specialists. Careers information can easily be embedded into subject teaching and can increase engagement and attainment: when pupils see the applicability of their learning and its link to long-term career goals, motivation increases. Recent research focused on pupil perception of science, technology, engineering and maths (STEM) subjects (BIS, 2014) discovered that pupils often misunderstood or were unware of the jobs which STEM subjects lead to, or the career routes which would be closed by not taking those subjects for GCSE or A-Level. Poorer pupils were most likely to hold these misconceptions. Our research defines two effective ways in which subject teachers can deliver careers content. Firstly, integrated into lessons delivered by the teacher (e.g. pupils studying a play in English learn about the role of a graphic designer and design a theatre programme). Alternatively, careers content can exist ‘beside’ the curriculum: in the form of trips, talks and enrichment projects delivered by others and integrated into long-term curriculum planning. Teachers are an important source of social capital, particularly for pupils from low income families who may have less professional contacts (BIS, 2014). School input is therefore potentially life-changing. It is important to recognise that teachers are not impartial and may have limited experience so they can only be one of many career informants to expose pupils to a range of routes. For instance, teachers have often progressed from university to teacher training and so have useful insights about UCAS processes but less experience of vocational routes.’

Form Tutors: ‘As a form tutor, teachers are often a first port of call for students’ concerns or personal issues. In terms of careers, this often means discussing choices at key points in secondary school (choosing GCSEs in Year 8 or 9; post-16 options in Year 11; and post-18 options in Year 12/13). Form tutors often build more informal relationships with pupils. By sharing information about their own career choices and those of people they know, form tutors can help shape pupils’ understanding of routes into employment as a ‘career informant.  Form tutors are also often the initial contact point for parents, likely to discuss pupil choices at parents’ evenings. Research by the Department for Business, Innovation and Skills found that low income parents were more likely to let the school lead the conversation about their child’s career and subject choices (BIS, 2014), emphasising the importance of a teacher’s role for these pupils.’

To link curriculum learning to careers we will:

Ensure all / the overwhelming majority of students by the end of Year 9, have meaningfully experienced career learning as part of English/Maths, PSHE and Science lessons and will support our teachers to see how to link career learning to their subjects. 

To further develop encounters with employers and employees we will:

Ensure all / the overwhelming majority of students have at least one meaningful encounter with an employer every year they are at Norwood.

Please refer to the powerpoint below that was delivered by Independent Careers Advisors Claire Nix and Trevor Bottomly to HOF's. The session's purpose was to explore a range of possible links to employers and careers guidance from a subject leaders point of view.