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Monmouth Comprehensive School reformed its work experience programme by helping pupils take control of their placements, accrediting pupils’ learning and formally celebrating their achievements.
The two week year 10 work experience placement had always given pupils a valuable taste of the world of work. However, until recently, it was very much ad hoc and add-on, and did little to help the school implement its vision statement of ‘learning to lead our lives.’ In 2006-07 it was decided to change this to make the placement an integral part of the school’s philosophy and practice.
The school focused on three key areas:
We took all 270 Year 10 pupils off-timetable for an Introduction to work experience day. Pupils worked with their form tutors on understanding the rationale for work experience and the methods of securing placements. We invited parents to an information evening, where we shared the educational benefits of work experience and discussed the issues to be considered when sourcing placements, including:
Pupils were given individual support by form tutors, the school’s youth worker, and the work experience team from the local careers service. Immediately prior to going on work experience, pupils worked with their form tutors on how to manage their placements, and how to overcome any difficulties they might encounter.
Shortly before going on their placements pupils were given time to formally discuss with each other how they secured their placements and what their expectations of work experience were. On their return to school they:
These formed portfolios to be submitted for key skills accreditation. This was made possible by moving the work experience placement from July (the end of the summer term) to April (at the beginning of the summer term).
We held this on the penultimate day of the summer term and brought together all the key stakeholders: school staff, pupils, parents and placement providers. All pupils received a work experience certificate, and 21 pupils received twelve-inch tall golden ‘Oscars’ – provided free of charge by one of the event sponsors.
Oscars were awarded either for achievement in specific occupational areas, such as teaching or engineering, or for generic work skills, such as determination, initiative or problem solving. We used both the placement providers’ reports and the feedback from visiting staff in order to determine the 21 prize winners.
Lunch prior to the Oscars was provided by GCSE Catering pupils, and the event was filmed by the sixth form film crew. Certificates and Oscars were presented by the chief executive of the local careers service. The ceremony was sponsored by Timpsons (which provided the trophies), Airbus and Waitrose
The changes met with considerable but not complete success. Over 80% of pupils set up their own placements, and by taking control of them, pupils also thrived while on placement. Additionally, by the end of July, a great many pupils were ready to submit their portfolios for accreditation in Communication key skills.
The Oscars ceremony at the end of term proved an uplifting end of year event for year 10, and succeeded in providing recognition and celebration for work experience. Approximately 70% of parents attended the information evening and the Oscars.
We now need to focus on providing improved and tailored support for the 20% who did not set up their placements. This will involve:
We also need to work on simplifying the key skills portfolio, and to enable pupils to use work generated earlier in the year as evidence.
Finally, we must work harder to bring placement providers into the fold. They did not, in general, attend either the Oscars or the preceding lunch, perhaps because the time commitment was too great. One innovation will be to invite some providers to the Introduction to work experience day to talk about the placement providers’ perspective on work experience. We also hope that by inviting placement providers to lunch independently of the Oscars ceremony, more will be able to attend.
Monmouth Comprehensive School is an 11-18 co-educational comprehensive serving a rural area in the Welsh and English borders. There are 1700 students on roll, with 270 in year 10.
Edwin TowillLearning Pathways and Work Experience Coordinator edwintowill@monmouthshire.gov.uk