School visits from employers
Imagine having a female engineer or a male midwife come into your school to speak about what they do, or taking pupils on a visit to a local fire station or construction site to see men and women of all backgrounds at work; or how about visiting a vibrant local university?
This kind of first-hand experience of the real world of work can be life-changing for pupils, opening their eyes to possibilities they would never have otherwise considered and leaving a lasting impression on them.
Visits from workforce ambassadors, or to places of work, can also be the perfect introduction or consolidation to your in-class work on careers and equality.
There’s a wealth of employers and organisations out there that are willing and in fact actively looking to engage with schools, it’s just a case of getting in touch.
This section is all about setting up visits and engaging with local employers. We’ve specifically focused on some of the sectors where we believe there are equality-related issues to be addressed.
We outline the equality-related issues, offer suggestions of organisations you might like to contact, and share case studies of work some of these organisations are doing with schools already, to give you inspiration.
View information about a specific sector by clicking on the links below.
Before you take your class on a visit to an employer, ask them to complete a short evaluation form covering what they expect to see in the workplace and which jobs they expect to encounter. This will provide a great basis for discussions following the visit and will most likely reveal significant differences between pupils’ expectations and reality (e.g. they might expect a factory to be dirty whereas it is more likely to be a highly technological environment).
Some of the key equality issues which are explored further in the relevant sectors below are also detailed in full in the ‘Why teach’ section.
Click on the relevant link for information about arranging visits related to each sector.
Last Updated: 13 Mar 2014