Personal guidance
Every learner should have opportunities for guidance meetings with a Careers Adviser, who could be internal (a member of staff) or external, provided they are trained to an appropriate level. These meetings should be available for all learners whenever significant study or career choices are being made. They should be expected for all learners but should be scheduled to meet their individual needs. The Careers Leader should work closely with the Careers Adviser, SEND coordinator (SENDCO and other key staff to ensure personal guidance is effective and embedded in the careers programme.
What good looks like
School
- Every pupil should have at least one personal guidance meeting with a Careers Adviser by the age of 16, and a further meeting by the age of 18. Meetings should be scheduled in the careers programme to meet the needs of pupils.
- Information about personal guidance support and how to access it should be communicated to pupils and parents and carers, including through the school website.
Further Education
- Every learner should have at least one personal guidance meeting with a Careers Adviser. Meetings should be scheduled in the careers programme to meet the needs of learners.
- Information about personal guidance support and how to access it should be communicated to learners, parents and carers and other stakeholders, including through the provider website.
The resources below are designed to support you with Gatsby Benchmark 8. To explore all of the Gatsby Benchmarks in greater depth, download the toolkit that best aligns with your setting.
Work with key colleagues to identify and consider the timing and regularity of personal guidance. Robust systems should be in place to ensure that personal guidance meetings are responsive to learner need and scheduled appropriately. This resource will support with mapping and enhancing current provision.
For best practice in commissioning independent careers guidance services, use the CDI guide and ‘Find a Registered Career Development Professional’ tool on the CDI website.
Time spent with a Careers Adviser is valuable, so ensuring all involved, including parents and carers, understand its value and purpose is crucial to maximise impact. Access the CEC resources and support for parents and carers, including the FREE Parental Engagement in Careers CPD, to ensure parents and carers add value to your approach to personal guidance
Education Leaders and Governors:
Education Leaders and Governors: For further information on each Benchmark, to support you in your role, please see the Education Leader, Secondary and College Governor Guides.
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Black Country Vocational Profile
A SEND pupil centred planning tool specifically geared to employment and to support quality transitions.
Routing for Them
Developed by Solihull Careers Hub. This is a parent/carer’s simple guide to education, training and employment pathways.
Routing for Them - SEND
Developed by Solihull Careers Hub. This resource is parent’s/carer’s simple guide to education, training and employment pathways for those with SEND.
Career HELP Advice System
A free comprehensive online careers system that uniquely provides students, teachers and advisors with all that they need. Based upon a personal profile quiz that uses only graphic images, it is now widely used in UK schools.
CareerEar
CareerEar is an online careers advice and exploration platform and the first of its kind to combine direct and personal advice, with relevant labour market data, in order to help people make the most informed decisions.
CDI quality assurance of career development interventions
This framework will help career development professionals to quality assure their career development interventions and determine any areas that may require development.
LMI Update Template for KS4 students
An editable resource designed to be populated by Careers Leaders to reflect local information, to be given to KS4 students before their 1:1 guidance sessions.
Skills Builder: Launchpad
Skills Builder Launchpad is online resource platform for you to build your own essential skills through interactive, online modules.
Naturally Talented Me
This Gatsby Benchmark-aligned profiling platform is designed to present and evidence an individual’s natural talents – and align them with real job requirements.
What’s your strength?® - Free Downloads
Careers Adviser, Katherine Jennick, the creator of the award winning What’s your strength?® cards, has developed a number of strength-based tools which are free to download.
What’s your strength?® cards - teen pack
Award winning self-awareness tool that empowers young people to discover their own skills and qualities and realise how amazing they are!
This is a costed resource.
What’s your strength?® - Let’s get started!
An interactive card activity made in collaboration with Skills Builder, Let’s get started! empowers young people to discover their own skills and qualities and realise how amazing they are!
This is a costed resource.