W ork placement is a hands-on opportunity to get real world experience within industry. This allows students to apply theory from the classroom into employment but also to gain first hand examples to help them contextualise their learning within the classroom for examinations, assessments and coursework. Placement opportunities are invaluable for vocational students and can offer benefits to both the student and employer. In the past many employers have offered students paid work opportunities from their placements.

• H ealth and Social Care 
• T Level Management and Administration
• T Level Education 
  

T-Level Management and Administration

I n Lower Sixth the students start their one-day-per-week placement in January. From September until their placement starts the students will work on building their awareness of the working environment. We will spend time on the importance of communication and how to meet professional standards as well as learning the range of different policies and procedures businesses have. It is usual for our students to be interviewed for their placement so we will help to prepare students for this. Some placements like to start with a block placement, whilst others are happy for students to start one day per week. All students will undertake induction training with their employer. Placements so far have focused on businesses in marketing, sales, business administration, finance, HR and customer engagement. We do encourage students to think about a placement within an industry that they are interested in pursuing a career in after their Sixth form studies. Students will take a break from the placement while they sit their Cire Exams and complete their Employer Set Project in the spring term.

In Upper Sixth, the students will continue with their Lower Sixth one-day-per-week placement and where possible the organisations will try to provide more Management work shadowing to help support the Occupational Specialism we study on Leadership and Management. They will also try to give students experience in another department to broaden their understanding of the sector. Many of our students have been given individual projects to work on and they have found this has utilised their T Level subject knowledge and increased their confidence. Several students this year have been offered paid summer work or an apprenticeship upon completion of the course.

T-Level ​Education & Early Years

Students must complete a minimum of 750 hours two days a week on placement throughout the two years and achieve their Early Years competencies to gain their Early Years Educator status. Early Years Educator status means students are qualified on completion of their T level to work at supervisory level within an early years environment or continue their studies within Higher Education. Students will carry out three placements over the two years, one in a nursery and one in a school environment to assist them in choosing their career pathway. They have formal assessments on placement by their teacher and an examiner within the second year to demonstrate their knowledge and competencies via an observation of them implementing an activity that they have planned for the children and a professional discussion.

Past students have been successful in gaining employment offers during school holidays and permanent Early Years Educator contracts on completion of their T Level placements at Busybees Nursery, Chapelfield Day Nursery, Blofield Day Nursery, Limetree Day Nursery, St Williams afterschool club.

Health and Social Care Advanced Specialist Qualification

Students carry out placement one day a week for two years. This will be with a company in the digital sector, the role will relate to either website development, software development or more IT support/ hardware related.

Students gain greatly from their placements, as it gives them a hands-on opportunity to gain an insight into working in the tech sector. As students are in the placement for an extended period of time, they get to know what it is like to work as part of a team and are assigned a variety of tasks to complete. It will help them learn valuable skills for working in the tech sector, both in terms of the technology and programming they will learn, as well as a variety of skills that will come in useful for working in any sector; communication and collaboration, time management, networking skills, critical thinking, bring proactive, self-awareness and creativity among others. A number of our students have also secured apprenticeships and work at their placements when they complete the course.