Careers, employability and progression
Your time at sixth form college is a vital stepping stone to securing a place at university, a higher level apprenticeship or embarking on a career.
Our highly experienced careers team provides a progressive programme of tutor sessions, events and individual guidance to support students with their individual plans. The programme helps them explore opportunities, focus on decision-making and make competitive applications to university and higher-level apprenticeships. They are able to book one-to-one careers appointments or attend a drop-in at any point during their time at college. The team also organises events throughout the year including a Higher Education Fair, Futures Fair, mock interviews, specialist “Careers in..” days, and a range of other events when we welcome local and national employers, alumni and university admissions tutors to Barton Peveril. Parents, guardians and students are kept informed by half-termly Careers Bulletins and talks from the careers team.
Higher Education
The majority of our students choose to go to university, and the tutor programme incorporates regular sessions on everything from making choices to filling in UCAS applications. Regular personal statement clinics and one-to-one support are on offer throughout the college year. Our aim is to make students ambitious with their choices but also to feel that they are going to the right place for them.
The Aspire Programme
The Aspire Programme is a timetabled programme of weekly activities aimed at providing students with the higher order thinking skills they will need to make successful applications to top universities. Students are able to attend talks by university lecturers, industry professionals, medics and opinion-formers, as well as joining in debates, committees, trips and workshops. We also run a specialist mentoring scheme for students aiming at Oxbridge and medical, veterinary or dentistry schools.
Employability Support: Finding Employment and Apprenticeships
For students targeting employment and competitive apprenticeships after College, they receive support from the Careers Team through the Employability Programme and JobSmart Q-XTRA. The Employability Programme runs throughout a student’s First Year of College, focusing on and supporting the development of employability skills, readying students for making applications in their Second Year of study. JobSmart is an additional course students can pick up at any point throughout their time at College, which supports the application and interview process for both part-time and full-time employment.
The Barton Peveril Employer Partnership
To help students build better skills and to address the local labour market’s needs, Barton Peveril has created an Employer Partnership of 13 employers based in the Solent region. Through this collaboration, the employers and the College ensure skills link closely with real work and jobs. This helps employers better meet their diverse higher level skills needs and its benefits are found in improved business performance and productivity. Employer partners include Airbus, Latitude Recruitment, and Fiander Tovell.
Work Experience and Volunteering
Our Work Experience and Volunteering programme benefits from excellent links with local and national employers who provide stimulating and challenging placement opportunities.
All students at Barton Peveril are expected to undertake some form of work experience during their time at College and a dedicated work experience week takes place within the summer of students’ first year. For those on double and triple vocational qualifications, students will have a dedicated work experience week within the summer term of their First Year.
Students considering careers in medicine, teaching, allied to healthcare professions, veterinary science and engineering should be completing work experience placements in support of their application to university. This helps to focus their choice of university course and adds a positive element to their UCAS personal statements and CVs. Work experience should also be undertaken by those looking towards apprenticeships and employment after college to bolster their CVs and applications.
Students are expected to find their own placements and volunteering opportunities, but support is available from our experience Work Experience Team who students can book in to see throughout their time at college.
Click here to hear from employers working with Barton Peveril.
How we measure the impact of the Careers Programme
All of our data concerning the future plans of our students is captured in the annual Destinations Report. We capture and examine the number of students applying to university, FE and other providers (both in year and deferred). We also track and capture data for students applying for apprenticeships and employment and the ways in which this data connects to the curriculum areas. The Destinations Report helps us to ensure, year on year, all students are supported by the Careers Programme.
Retention and progression
Student ‘retention’ (the percentage of students who get to the end of their study programme): 96.7%
Student ‘destinations’ (the percentage of students who continue to education, training, or employment): 90.98%
The information on this page is reviewed at the start of each academic year.
