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Enterprise Adviser Impact in alternate provision Ali Haynes, Denise Firth
What challenge did you/the school face and how was this identified?
iCollege were struggling to encourage employer engagement across all the college units. They wanted to work with a range of employers to allow their students to develop an understanding of different career opportunities and pathways, making sure that it was across all year groups.
What actions did you take to address this challenge?
iCollege engaged fully with Careers and Enterprise Company (CEC) at every opportunity and after a couple of unsuccessful Enterprise Adviser (EA) placements they found a person who could empathise with their students and had understood their needs.
The EA regularly attended meetings at the college to meet the Careers Leader (CL), Assistant Head (AH) and governor to fully understand the school and find out how they could support the college in understanding employer needs in relation to careers leader related activities.
There were termly meetings with the CL, EA, AH, Enterprise Coordinator (EC) and governor to discuss and plan employer engagement opportunities and review what had previously happened.
What were the outcomes of the actions you took?
The outcome is that the EA is embedded within careers development across the site and arranged/ facilitated many activities including:
- Visits to company sites (EA’s organisation and other businesses) to understand different roles within a company.
- Employers coming into college to speak to individual or small groups of students.
- Giving training support with IT systems.
- Arranging work experience sessions depending on individual needs
Students are now given more relevant development opportunities across each year group which are spread throughout the year.
Careers programme is well received by all, it is exciting for students and uplifting for staff. Fantastic support from the EA to the college.
Working with the EC and EA has helped to improve iCollege’s Compass score, which has increased to 99%.
What are your next steps?
- Starting succession planning with a new EA from the same company to replace the existing one as he is about to retire.
- Continue to develop EA role as it consistently evolving!
- Planning next year’s programme – adjustments being made due to retirement of EA, handing over to new staff members, evaluation of individual activities that have taken place to enhance them for the next year.
- Continue to be understanding of each other’s issues.
- Work with new employers and businesses in similar ways, showcasing what has previously worked well.
If you have any questions on how you too might drive this sort of change at your school, then please contact the Berkshire team at careersandenterprise@thamesvalleyberkshire.co.uk.
