The Flagpole

At Princethorpe College we believe that Work Experience is a vital part of any young person’s journey, and it has long been a part of our Careers Programme. A good placement can provide a huge insight into an area of work, but it can also develop skills such as communication, self-confidence, initiative and teamwork.

Don't take it from us though. Please read on to find out how Ben, one of our student's, got on when he completed a week's placement last year.

"I completed a week's work experience placement at Mott MacDonald in Birmingham in February Half Term 2023. Mott MacDonald is a global engineering and development company. During the week, I completed a presentation on how I would design a high-speed rail route from Birmingham to London. I had to go into great depth, including pricing the project and designing the carriages for the train itself. During this time, I spoke with lots of employees for the company in various roles who told me about what they do day-to-day and some projects that they had worked on in the past. At the end of the week, I presented my project to some of these employees at Mott MacDonald and got awarded an EDT Industrial Cadets Bronze certificate. Overall, I had a very valuable experience with the company, and I gained a further understanding of the dynamics of a workplace environment. I would highly recommend doing a work experience placement, it definitely helped me decide on what my next steps were after A-levels and is a great way to explore what you want (or don't want) to do when you're older."

We expect all of our students to complete at least one work experience placement of around a week in either Year 10 or Year 11, but they can, if they wish, undertake more than one placement or placements of longer duration. These placements can take place during any of the school holidays. Sixth form students are encouraged to complete another placement during the Lower Sixth.

Normally, students are expected to find their own placement(s) through friends, family or through other initiatives; once a placement has been found then the information will need to be added to our Placements Portal on Unifrog.org.

If any parents are able to offer a work experience placement to any of our students then do please email me.

We are using Unifrog (www.unifrog.org) to manage the administration of the work experience programme – for example collecting information from the employer about their Risk Assessment and Health and Safety policy, as well as getting agreement from yourselves for the placement to go ahead.

Some important logistics:

Students need to agree the placement with the employer first, and then students will get the ball rolling by adding the placement to their Unifrog account (they’ll find the Placements tool on their Unifrog homepage). Please choose my name as the school contact from the drop down list.

The Unifrog system will then email the employer, the parent/guardian, and the school, to collect the necessary information and permissions. For the process to work, it’s essential that students add the initial information about the placement accurately. If students have forgotten their Unifrog login details then they should use their school email address and click the forgotten password link.

Finding out more:

Unifrog have created a set of guides about placements which you can find here.

Some pupils, might prefer to start with a virtual work experience placement and these too, can be very valuable in giving insight into a particular career sector. These still need to be entered on the Unifrog Placements tool as this will provide a record of what work experience has been completed. There are a great number of these placements available through the following link:

https://www.springpod.com/virtual-work-experience

Please do not hesitate to contact me if you have any queries. My email address is jacquiquinney@princethorpe.co.uk. 

Jacqui Quinney
Head of Careers