Are you a parent of a teenager who is going to be making decisions around careers and courses?
Are you looking at ways to help and support them with this?
These tips and ideas will help:
Have regular conversations about their ideas, preferably in a natural way whilst doing something else, as they are more likely to engage with this than sitting them down for a ‘discussion’!
Keep an open mind and don’t be judgmental about their ideas and about new careers and courses you may not have heard of
Try to get the balance-it is their decision to make but support them as much as you can, whilst leaving the final decision to them
Talk to teachers, careers staff and college staff and find out as much information as you can. The more information you have the more likely you will be able to make an informed decision alongside your teenager
Attend all parents’ evenings to keep up to date with their progress, as predicted exam grades will be important for future decisions
Get Professional Advice. Their school should have an independent Careers Guidance Professional available to work with students and parents. Request a Careers Interview and go along as well if you feel it would help. If your school does not provide this, you could feedback to a senior member of staff that as a parent you would like to have this service available. Dart Careers can provide an extensive range of careers guidance services to individuals.
Key events: School 6th form open evenings, college open days and evenings, local career and Apprenticeship events. Make sure you know when these are taking place and encourage your teenager to attend these events and accompany them where possible
Extra activities can really help your teenager and give them a head start in thinking and deciding about careers. Look out for:
- University taster/experience days (often open to students from year 10)
- Career fairs
- University open days (Younger students can attend these to find out more about university)
- Skills shows-Lots of employers and trainers with careers and job advice, along with practical taster activities. The main one takes place in November in Birmingham, but there are regional events throughout the year. The South West event takes place at the Plymouth Pavilions on 1 and 2 march 2017
- Large company visit/open days (e.g. Met office)
Encourage them to take up any opportunities for voluntary work or work experience, as this is really important to build up their experience and for adding to their C.V., application forms or personal statement.
Do some research so you know important things your teenager may be talking about, such as:
- What is a BTEC?
- How do apprenticeships work?
- What are the deadlines for university applications?
- Are there alternatives to university?
Encourage them to take up both clubs and societies within school and activities outside of school. This will help build their confidence as well as providing them with useful material for CV’s and application forms later on
Don’t worry if your teenager does not seem to have any career ideas-this will develop in time and as long as they are doing a broad range of subjects to keep their options open, they will be able to decide later on
Useful Websites
Careers information and profiling site from U-explore. Includes a careers questionnaire, which suggests career areas to consider based on responses to a set of questions
Lots of useful advice on careers and options for those leaving school, including a useful quiz
www.nationalcareersservice.direct.gov.uk
Detailed information on almost every job available. Go to ‘career tools’ and then ‘job profiles’ and type in job of interest
www.regionalskillsevents.co.uk
Details on all the skills show events taking place around the country
Lots of useful information on a wide variety of taster days, open days and other activities to help young people find out more about university
www.careersadviceforparents.org
Useful general sites covering many aspects of how to support your teenager, along with information on qualifications, apprenticeships and university.
(Image 1 courtesy of stockimages at FreeDigitalPhotos.net. Image 2 courtesy of Yongkiet at FreeDigitalPhotos.net )