CEIAG for Headteachers, Governors and SLT
What small thing can you do to preserve social mobility in schools?
Saturday 21st September 2013
Today I gave a presentation, Social Mobility needs Careers Learning, to the Labour Teachers Teachmeet on the fringes of the party conference in Brighton. My topic was
Social Mobility Presentation"The Government's attack on careers advice and guidance to 11-19 year old will lead to a more divisive society and lack of social mobility. We need to get all teachers behind careers learning to counteract that trend."
Coincidentally, Kate Green MP wrote this piece in the Guardian today http://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2013/sep/21/investing-children-labour-one-nation It neatly highlights one of my comments, that many pupils think that if they can't go to university they've failed. If pupils and teachers are more versed in the realities of career planning in the 21st C, maybe less promising young people will consign themselves to the tundra of meaningless work and little social mobility.
Following Gove's action of removing the mechanism of support for school's careers learning (Education Business Partnerships & Connexions) and the passing of responsibility for that provision to schools directly. We now face an untenable situation when social mobility becomes even harder for most.
Cloudy Horizons Pearson Think Tank 2013Post the Pearson's Think Tank report Cloudy Horizons, it is becoming more apparent that whilst most independent schools have maintained their high standard of careers learning, over a quarter of state schools have lessened their offer. Therefore, I ask all teachers, heads, principals, SLTs and MLTs to look at my presentation, consider what you can do, be it small or large, to support careers learning as part of your lesson, department or school, then please add your commitment to the comments. Let's share the workload.
