Careers Programme

Aurora Eccles School Careers Programme

All students are entitled to and will receive impartial and independent careers education advice and guidance which will inform their longer-term career goal:

·To help students learn to understand themselves and develop their capabilities and skills.
To develop an understanding of the range of opportunities available from Year 9 onwards. This will include technical education routes, appropriate college courses and apprenticeships.
To support inclusion, challenge stereotyping and promote equality of opportunities.
To enable students to explore careers through employer encounters, online resources, and the careers curriculum we implement in form time.
To raise students’ self-esteem and confidence which will allow them to realise their true potential.
To help students manage their career planning, by giving them the tools which will enable them to make decisions based on interests and abilities and current labour market information.
To raise student aspiration to prevent disengagement from the learning process
To provide the opportunity for students to learn about STEM (Science Technology, Engineering and Maths) related careers.
Opportunities to access a number of events, integrated into the school’s careers programme, will allow pupils to visit a number of colleges in the area to enable pupils to choose from a range of courses on offer.

At Aurora Eccles the eight Gatsby Benchmarks of Good Career Guidance are followed:

The Gatsby Benchmarks

A stable career programme	Aurora Eccles School has an embedded programme of career education and guidance that is known and understood by pupils, parents, teachers and employers.
Learning from career and labour market information	At Aurora we organise access to independent careers advice through Beacon East.
Addressing the needs of each student	Opportunities for advice and support are tailored to the needs of each pupil, paying particular attention to individual EHCP plans. The school's career programme embeds equality and diversity considerations throughout.
Linking curriculum learning to careers	Teachers at Aurora Eccles will take opportunities to link curriculum learning with careers.
Encounters with employers and employees	The school has met 75% of BM4, compared to 0% previously. This was linked to the pandemic and was representative of the time the benchmarking exercise took place. 58% of schools are nationally meeting this benchmark.
Experiences of workplaces	There are multiple opportunities for pupils at Aurora Eccles to learn from employers about work through the work experience programme.
Encounters with further and higher education	Year 11 pupil will have the opportunity to visit a range of learning opportunities, including sixth forms and colleges.
Personal guidance	Every pupil has the opportunity for guidance with an independent careers advisor through Beacon East. Guidance is also available with staff members at Aurora Eccles.

At Aurora Eccles we use independent careers advice through Beacon East. The advisor comes in across the academic year and spends time with the students. During the meeting each student is supported by a familiar adult from their classroom and parents/carers are encouraged to join the meetings via Teams as they are an integral part of the support network around the student.

Year 11 students can visit different colleges within school hours, and this is supported by their class teams. This enables them to see what each college in the local area can offer and gives them opportunities to meet college staff and students, so they have an accurate picture of what college life is like.

Year 11 students and families can access bespoke support from class teams and our assistant SENDCo, Jane Negal when it comes to applying to colleges, liaising with colleges and attending interviews at colleges.

During form time each class (from Year 7-11) has a structured curriculum to broaden their knowledge of academic pathways and future career choices to enable them to begin to make informed decisions about their future.