Baroness Morgan talks careers with students.
Baroness Morgan visited a Leicester school to see how a focus on careers is helping school leavers into education and employment.
The former Secretary of State for Education Baroness Morgan of Cotes met with staff and students as she visited The City of Leicester College as part of National Careers Week.
She visited the school to see how a focus on careers is helping school leavers into education and employment.
Baroness Morgan, a board member of the Careers and Enterprise Company (CEC), learned how her organisation’s Compass+ online system is helping schools and colleges across the country.
With the view to design careers education programmes that improve the support offered to students, the system at the college is one of 91 schools in the Leicester and Leicestershire Enterprise Partnership (LLEP) Careers Hub.
The Evington school has recently been working with Year 9 students to gather information in Compass+ relating to their career ambitions as they prepare to choose their options.
Baroness Morgan met with the students and discussed their plans, ambitions and aspirations while also talking about her own career and taking questions from students.
The former MP for Loughborough said: “It was fantastic to meet so many staff and students. The City of Leicester College is offering brilliant support to its students to help them prepare for the world of work.
“It is leading the way in the development of modern, high quality careers education, and it’s great to see how innovative new digital tools like Compass+ are being put into action.
“This sort of sophisticated approach to careers education is being rolled out right across the country.
"Helping a generation of young people to be as prepared as possible for the jobs of the future, while also making it easier and easier for businesses of every shape and size to work with schools.
“When I first started to create a national system to improve careers education this is exactly the sort of impact I wanted to see happening.
"I couldn’t be more proud that places like Leicester and Leicestershire are helping to lead the way.”
Baroness Morgan also spoke with Headteacher Ken Vernon and Chris Dakin, Assistant Headteacher and Careers Leader, about careers provision, challenges and priorities for young people choosing careers.
Mr Vernon said: “As a school, we are ambitious for all of our students. That extends to their lives after they leave us so that our local community continues to flourish.
“Careers education is a vital component in trying to ensure all of our learners are on the right pathway towards their goals. It is reflected in the extremely high number of our ex-students who are in education or employment.
“We were very excited to show off all of the great work our team has been doing around careers education and show what is possible for students from all backgrounds.”
The CEC is the national body for careers education in England. It works with Government to support schools and colleges in delivery of modern careers education.
It also brings together employers, educators and providers through a network of Careers Hubs.
The LLEP Careers Hub was one of the first in the country to encourage schools to develop the Compass+ service and the area has a higher-than-average national rate for use.
Verity Hancock, Principal of Leicester College and Chair of the LLEP’s Skills Advisory Panel, said: “The LLEP Careers Strategy contains clear objectives to raise aspirations of students.
"It helps to ensure school leavers progress to appropriate destinations, serve the needs of the community, and develop transferable employability skills.”
The City of Leicester College offers careers support from Year 7 through a variety of interactive workshops, careers fairs, employer talks, guest speakers and trips to colleges and universities. Careers are built into teaching of all year groups.
The school’s NEET figures are consistently below both local authority and national average, with data showing 86% of Year 13 leavers in 2019 were in education or employment for at least two terms - 5% ahead of the national average.
Written by Emily Miller
Emily is a Senior Journalist for Niche Magazine with over a decade of journalism experience. She enjoys going to gigs, visiting galleries and walking in all weathers.
