Alice Coates' experience with CELP

When I started at Appleton Academy there was already someone leading careers provision in the school, but unfortunately they didn’t have the capacity to implement a school-wide strategy. Instead it was targeted only at students in certain years. This meant some pupils were missing out on support and we weren’t able to plan for what help the pupils needed over the duration of their time in the school. 

Luckily, the school had identified these problems and were keen to make some changes, so chose to participate in the pilot of Teach First’s Careers Leader Programme and chose me to lead it. This was a really positive experience for both me and the school – the training has helped us to design and evaluate a careers programme for each year group, resulting in a positive impact for all our pupils. 

The training has helped us to design and evaluate a careers programme for each year group.

The careers team now run teacher training lessons in the school and as a result teachers now approach the careers team to discuss how to use careers and employability to make their lessons more engaging. We’re also really focused on getting businesses into the school to inspire the students, have careers fairs and organise residential trips to universities. It’s been great to be trained to understand more about the benchmarks, so we can properly evaluate the careers work we’re doing and guide us in the future. 

It’s also been amazing to see wider awareness of the value of careers across both the senior leadership team and the other teachers in the school. We did a questionnaire at the start and the end of the programme and one of the biggest differences was the increased value that the Senior Leadership Team are now placing on careers provisions. 

One of the biggest differences was the increased value that the Senior Leadership Team are now placing on careers provisions.

A key consideration for us now is to ensure that the current careers provision is sustainable and would continue without the present careers team. We are working to involve more teachers and NQTs in careers and embedding a clear schedule of regular activities.