Summary of the Department for Education's 2014 Careers Guidance Provision for Schools
In April 2014 the Department for Education released new statutory guidance on Careers Guidance Provision for young people in schools. We have summarised the key points for quick reading for busy teachers. The government also released a similar set of guidance for colleges.
Attitudes, aspirations and values
In May of 2013 Barclays LifeSkills Youth Barometer released a report that indicated that 45% of young people aged 14-25 believe a lack of self confidence will be the main barrier to achieving their dream futures. In an extensive report by the Department of Education and Skill in 2003, it was recognised that attitudes to the future were severely constrained by perception of opportunities, predispositions and personal history.
The report also revealed that attitudes vary with age, gender, location, culture and socioeconomic status. The Education Endowment Fund commissioned a report on aspiration interventions in 2014 that indicated that although students may have high aspirations, the main problem is the gap between aspirations and how to achieve them. It is clear that high aspirations are key to young people achieving their desired futures, but that we need to work on how we facilitate this.
By helping young people understand their personal values, we can help cultivate a sense of value in themselves, therefore influencing the expression of these values in attitudes towards education and work. With more positive attitudes, we can then nurture a generation of young people with the confidence to have high aspirations and achieve them.
Awareness is linked to aspirations
In October 2011 the Joseph Rowntree Foundation produced a report that concluded that low aspirations of young people and their families often explain their educational and work outcomes. Many work experience opportunities available to young people are outdated and unimaginative; those that do offer unique experiences are highly sought after, and can only be found through in depth searches.
For a lot of young people finding these opportunities, or even knowing that they exist is a challenge and they often are not equipped with enough information on the range of options available to them in the rapidly evolving 21st century. It is only once a young person reaches higher levels of education that awareness of specialisms becomes apparent, so those that do not pursue further or higher education are left at a disadvantage. As sustainability education becomes more popular, socially responsible pathways for future careers are also becoming more important.
Work experience can be limited
In 2012 City and Guilds released an evidence based report on views of young people on education and employment. Their main conclusion was that the link between education and employment is central to tackling the issue of youth unemployment. Currently, work experience is non-statutory in the UK according to a 2013 report by the Department for Education on post-16 work experience.
It is often up to the young people themselves to secure a placement, with little or no tailored guidance outside of their own personal experiences and worldviews on how to discover what they want to do or how to then develop this into a career prospect. Therefore, many young people could be set leave education without any idea of what they want to do, and without the skills or knowledge to pursue it.