A stable careers programme 

Every school and college should have an embedded programme of career education and guidance that is known and understood by pupils, parents, teachers and employers. 

• Every school should have a stable, structured careers programme that has the explicit backing of the senior management team, and has an identified and appropriately trained person responsible for it. 
• The careers programme should be published on the school’s website in a way that enables pupils, parents, teachers and employers to access and understand it.  
• The programme should be regularly evaluated with feedback from pupils, parents, teachers and employers as part of the evaluation process. 

(From Good Career Guidance website Gatsby benchmarks (goodcareerguidance.org.uk) ) 

There should be a suitably qualified member of staff identified as the Careers Lead who has implicit backing from the senior leadership team. 

When embedding careers education and guidance into the curriculum, it helps to have careers included on the senior leadership and governors' agendas to ensure requirements are identified and addressed. Careers Leaders should be able to provide information to these parties around current provisions and how these measure against the statutory requirements, the Gatsby Benchmarks and Ofsted, demonstrating current or predicted impact on student outcomes. This can help shape the schools careers programme and assist with future planning by ensuring that all careers provisions are defined, supported and delivered. The programme should be regularly evaluated and good practice would be to source feedback from students, school staff, parents and employers.  

There is a legal requirement for each school to publish their careers programme on their website enabling parents, students, school/college staff and employers to have access and an understanding of the programme. 

There should be an access process available for providers of technical and vocational qualifications and apprenticeships, allowing students to learn and make informed choices about all Post 16 and Post 18 routes at key transition stages. 

Further reading and resources can be found here: 

Additionally, educational establishments can also contact the Careers Hub about access to the Careers Hub portal found on the hub website for further reading and additional localised resources.