- About us
- About colleges
-
Corporate services
- Corporate services
- Mental health and wellbeing
- Data Protection/GDPR
-
Employment Services - college workforce
- Employment Services - college workforce
- Employment: How we support members
- Introduction & Employment Helpline
- Absence & Sickness Management
- Contracts and T&Cs
- Disciplinary, Capability & Grievance
- Employment Briefings Library
- Equality, Diversity & Inclusion
- General Employee Relations & HR Issues
- Holiday/annual leave related
- Industrial Relations
- ONS reclassification related guidance
- Pay & Pensions
- Recruitment
- Redundancy, Restructuring & TUPE
- Safeguarding/Prevent
- Workforce Benchmarking, Surveys & Research
-
Governance
- Governance
- Governance: How we support members
- Representation
- AoC National Chairs' Council
- National Governance Professionals' Group
- Code of Good Governance
- Student Governor Inductions
- Regional Governors Inductions & Conferences
- External Governance Reviews
- Resources
- Guidance
- Hot Topics
- Governance Briefings
-
Projects
- Projects
- Get Involved!
- Projects: How we support members
- Resources
- The 5Rs Approach to GCSE Maths Resits
- Apprenticeship Workforce Development (AWD) Programme
- Creating a Greener London – Sustainable Construction Skills
- Erasmus+ EXPECT Project
- Digital Roles Across Non-digital Industries
- T Level and T Level Foundation Year Provider Support Programme
- The Valuing Enrichment Project
- Higher and Extended Project Qualifications
- OfS - Higher Education Social Prescribing Project
- Pears Foundation Youth Social Action Programme: Phase 2
- T Level Professional Development (TLPD) Offer
- T Level Curriculum Macro-Sequencing
- Contact the Projects Team
- DfE Multiply Capability Support Programme
- Creative Arts in FE 2024 – developing student voice through creativity
- Resources/Guidance
- Sustainability & Climate Action Hub
- Partnerships
- Honours Nomination
- Brexit
- Recruitment and consultancy
-
Events and training
- Events and training
- Events
- T Level & T Level Foundation Year Events
- Events and training: How we support members
- Network Meetings
- Annual Conference & Exhibition 2023 Resources
- Previous Events & Webinars
- In-House Training
- Senior Leadership Development Programme
- Introducing AoC's Early Career and Experienced Middle Managers Programme
- Sponsorship & Exhibition Opportunities
- Funding and finance
-
Policy
- Policy
- Meet the Policy Team
- Policy: How we support members
- Policy Areas
- Policy Briefings
- Submissions
- Policy Papers & Reports
- AoC Strategy Groups
-
AoC Reference Groups
- AoC Reference Groups
- Adults (inc. ESOL) Reference Group
- Apprenticeship Reference Group
- Technology Reference Group
- HE Reference Group
- 14-16 Reference Group
- Mental Health Reference Group
- 16-18 Reference Group
- SEND Reference Group
- WorldSkills Reference Group
- HR Reference Group
- Sustainability & Climate Change Reference Group
- EDI Reference Group
- Opportunity England
- Research unit
-
News, campaigns and parliament
- News, campaigns and parliament
- General and mayoral election resources
- Comms advice and resources for colleges
- AoC Newsroom
- AoC Blogs
- Work in Parliament
- AoC Campaigns
- Briefings
- Contact the Communications, Media, Marketing and Research Team
- Communications, media, marketing and research: How we support members
- Equality, diversity and inclusion
- Home
- News, campaigns and parliament
- AoC Blogs
- Today’s children are tomorrow’s leaders
Today’s children are tomorrow’s leaders
For the last 18 months, we’ve been highlighting the importance of careers advice for young people through our Careers Guidance: Guaranteed campaign. The lack of independent advice for young people in school is hampering their ability to work out the right path for their future. That’s why today’s announcement by the Labour Party is a good starting point.
It’s pleasing that the announcement includes elements of what we’ve said in our manifesto – that schools, colleges, universities and employers need to work together in hubs to provide the most appropriate advice and guidance to 11 to 18-year-olds. We believe that this is the way young people can be fully informed of the choices they have - whether academic or technical, classroom or work-based.
Research we carried out last year showed that those aged under 16 turn to teachers and parents as their influencers of careers advice. But they shouldn’t be expected to rely on these people who, with the best will in the world, won’t be fully up to date with the variety of options available. The routes into careers have changed significantly in the last few years, and it would be impossible for them to be fully aware of all the pathways and their relevance to each individual student. The guarantee of face to face advice for all 11 to 18-year-olds by independent careers advisors is welcome but will not be enough in itself. As well as individual face to face advice we need to embed careers education across the curriculum. For example, however much we feel that today’s society has broken down barriers, there remains the problem of how gender stereotyping affects careers decisions. Proper careers education would help to overcome such stereotypes. Alongside this, young people could be taught about different types of business, the qualities needed by employers and many other areas, which aren’t covered by direct individual careers advice. Though less heralded in the announcement it was good also to note the commitment to wider career education in the Labour announcement.
So far during the short campaign, other parties have been quiet on how careers advice could be reformed, and this is a missed opportunity for them. Today’s children are tomorrow’s leaders. Let’s make sure we give them the support and advice they need to succeed.