AEIAG0117

Written evidence submitted by the Shaw trust

Key messages

• It is very important to distinguish between a) Careers Education within the curriculum and b) Specific, tailored Careers Advice delivered one to one by careers advisers to pupils/learners. Both are vital.
• We very much welcome the proposed duty on all schools to provide Careers Education and Information, Advice and Guidance (CEIAG) from 11 years old. However, consistently high standards, funding and resources are needed to deliver this duty in all schools, areas, and for all pupils/learners, particularly the most disadvantaged and vulnerable.
• The extent and quality of CEIAG varies greatly both between areas and between individual schools. The factors determining this include funding, modes and methods of delivery, whether the service is delivered in house or is outsourced which can affect impartiality, the quality of resources provided to support advisers and pupils/learners, and workforce pay and conditions. We note recent Sutton Trust research showing continuing variability in careers provision, with differences between state schools with more or less deprived intakes, and state and private schools. Sutton Trust found that nearly a third of state schoolteachers say they don’t have enough funding to deliver good quality careers education.
• Investment is urgently needed in the CEIAG delivery workforce to provide good qualifications, pay, terms and conditions and development opportunities for advisers.
• The level of funding devoted by local authorities to meet their duty to encourage, enable and assist young people to participate in education or training varies considerably; with some authorities providing qualified teams of Careers Advisers to support young people who are not in education, employment or training (NEET), while others are tracking the status of those subject to Raising the Participation Age legislation (RPA). In most cases local authorities do not fund CEIAG support for young people at risk of NEET who are still attending school or college.
• The end of the European Social Fund (ESF), and any gap before the People and Skills element of the UK Shared Prosperity Fund (UKSPF) being introduced will have a significant impact on Shaw Trust’s programmes for Children and Young People.
• Poor quality or absence of CEIAG means intergenerational unemployment and poverty will persist and get worse, particularly in the wake of Covid, which has affected disadvantaged and vulnerable learners the most. CEIAG is vital to improve poor learning and employment outcomes and smooth the transition from education, through vocational training, through to employment.
• Education, Health and Care Plans (EHCPs) provide some much needed structure to CEIAG and progression pathways for pupils with Special Educational Needs and Disabilities (SEND). However, SEND pupils without an EHCP face more problems in being guided on the options available to them, and supported with their progression. Shaw Trust is calling for expansion of Supported Internships to include SEND pupils without an EHCP.
• Those in care, NEETs and others with disadvantages and vulnerabilities often have chaotic, haphazard lives, are often not in education settings, and are even missing from council registers. This is a situation greatly exacerbated by the Covid pandemic.
• The Education Committee has rightly identified many key groups of disadvantaged learners. Included in these key groups should also be young carers, and children educated at home. The implications for CEIAG is a wide variation in learning, skills, training, and job opportunities around the country, and particularly in deprived areas.
• As a major children and young people’s residential care provider, Shaw Trust is aware that delivery of CEIAG in residential care settings is particularly difficult, alongside home educated children, and there is no funding available to provide it. The new duty must also address this situation given the very poor learning and employment outcomes for care leavers.
• High quality CEIAG should start at primary school, and continue through people’s lives, including for older workers needing to re/up-skill. Shaw Trust advocates for, and seeks to deliver, a ‘Child to Career’ strategic approach to support at key life stages, from school through to career support for displaced older workers, focused on prevention of problems and progress through to fulfilling careers.
• Schools are not aware of apprenticeship, internship and other vocational options to convey to pupils through careers education and advice. NEETs, pupils with SEND and other disadvantages need to be provided with Level 1 and 2 vocational qualifications, including vital steppingstones to the Lifetime Skills Guarantee entitlement to a first Level 3 qualification.
• To support a joined up ‘Child to Career’ strategic approach used by Shaw Trust, and for the government’s Plan for Jobs and Skills for Jobs White Paper pledges to be fully effective, there needs to be better join up between Department for Education (DfE) and Department for Work and Pensions (DWP). This should aim to achieve seamless ‘skills for jobs’ solutions to increase opportunity and growth through lifelong learning, breaking down silos and bridging gaps between traineeships, apprenticeships, careers advice, the Kickstart scheme, job searching and permanent work.
• The National Careers Service (NCS) provides standardised, impartial, high quality assured, regulated, one to one careers guidance, which can join up support to transition young people into adulthood. The NCS model could be expanded to support pupils/learners with its high quality careers advice from an earlier age.
• CEIAG must address the key impacts of the Covid pandemic on learning loss, missing children and young people, the move to digital/online learning, the long term effect of youth unemployment, and older workers exiting the workforce during the pandemic.

Clarifying the distinction between careers education and advice

It is very important to distinguish between a) Careers Education within the curriculum and b) Specific, tailored Careers Advice delivered one to one by careers advisers to pupils/learners. Both are vital, particularly for the most disadvantaged learners, and Shaw Trust’s submission will address both careers advice and education.

Response to inquiry specific questions

Does CEIAG serve young people and will Skills for Jobs White Paper proposals effectively address current challenges

We very much welcome the proposed duty on all schools to provide CEIAG from 11 years old. However, consistently high standards, funding and resources are required to deliver this duty in all schools, areas, and for all pupils/learners, particularly the most disadvantaged.

All pupils/learners, particularly the most disadvantaged, need access to uniformly high quality careers education, advice, resources, and material, which can also be tailored to individuals and around local skills needs and labour market information (LMI) in specific areas. Many institutions and individual advisers are having to create their own skills guides and LMI resources, which vary greatly in quality. High quality CEIAG needs to start from primary school, and continue throughout life, as set out later in this submission.

The provision of high quality, extensive, impartial CEIAG is currently very patchy. The extent and quality of CEIAG varies greatly from between areas and individual schools. The factors determining this include funding, modes/methods of delivery, whether the service is delivered in house or outsourced, the quality of resources provided to support advisers and pupils/learners, and the workforce - qualifications, pay, terms and conditions and development opportunities for advisers.

We note the recent Sutton Trust research showing continuing variability in careers provision, with differences between state schools with deprived intakes, state, and private schools. Sutton Trust found that nearly a third of state schoolteachers say they don’t have enough funding to deliver good quality careers education[1].

Whether CEIAG is provided by school employees in house or outsourced can affect the impartiality of education and advice provided. School employees may want to retain some pupils, and not others, affecting the CEIAG they provide.

The mode of delivery of CEIAG is also highly variable from area to area, ranging from delivery by a named individual – who may or not be fully impartial and independent – depending on whether they are an employee of the educational institution or outsourced sole traders. Employees of the school or college may not prioritise CEIAG on external learning and skills and training options for pupils they want to keep. CEIAG may also be used to move those a risk of NEET out of the institution.

Is greater investment needed to create a robust system, and how could this be targeted, to create a stronger CEIAG

The level of funding devoted by local authorities to meet their duty to encourage, enable and assist young people to participate in education or training varies considerably; with some authorities providing qualified teams of Careers Advisers to support NEET young people while others are tracking the status of those subject to RPA legislation. In most cases local authorities do not fund CEIAG support for young people at risk of NEET who are still attending school or college. From Shaw Trust’s NEET provision delivery experience, council funding cuts have led to reduction in NEET preventative work at an early age, for vulnerable and disadvantaged pupils.

There is an urgent need to invest in the Careers educator and adviser workforces, and provide them with improved pay, terms and conditions, and continuing professional development to deliver the CEIAG duty. Careers advisers are resigning and retiring, and they are not being replaced, there is a need to make the profession more attractive, with advisers are being recycled seeing the workforce is dwindling.

All pupils/learners, particularly the most disadvantaged, need access to uniformly high quality careers education and advice and resources and material, which can also be tailored to individuals and local skills needs and labour market information (LMI) in specific areas. Advisers can also lack background/experience in the profession, and support, information and resources, such as up to date, accurate and comprehensive LMI. Many institutions are having to create their own skills guides and LMI resources, which vary greatly in quality.

Shaw Trust provides its careers advisers for NEETs, and within the National Careers Service, with good pay, progression, terms and conditions, and full support and resources – particularly through local and regional labour market and skills information. Level 6 Continuing Professional Development (CPD) training is a key enabler to support high quality CEIAG outcomes, and we are currently delivering this in a range of establishments. Our advisers are also continuously trained to develop professionally, and to use LMI and skills resources to maximum effect for their benefit of learners.

Through our NCS delivery we make sure provision is of the highest quality through regular practice assessments, observations, and monitoring of advisers. We have in house specialists who produce in depth LMI and skills insights to support our colleagues.

The end of the ESF, and any gap before the People and Skills element of the UKSPF is introduced (as set out in the UKSPF Pre Launch Guidance published by the government alongside the Levelling Up White Paper[2]), will have a significant impact on Shaw Trust’s programmes for Children and Young People.

CEIAG for those from disadvantaged and vulnerable backgrounds and areas

Poor careers education and advice hits the disadvantaged and vulnerable most, partly because they do not have inspirational role models and social capital. Poor or no CEIAG means intergenerational unemployment and poverty could persist and worsen, particularly in the wake of Covid.

The Children’s Commissioner estimates around 2.3 million children and young people are growing up with vulnerability in England.  Risk factors are: 1) families under increased pressure; 2) children at risk or suffering harm; 3) children in care; 4) children at risk of falling behind in education. The Children’s Commissioner identified these issues as most likely to expose young people to poorer outcomes in attainment, well-being, and transition to adulthood, including employment[3].  

Good careers education and advice as a gateway to learning and skills and employment opportunities are key to addressing vulnerability and poverty, as a route to independence through achievement and agency. CEIAG is vital to improve poor learning and employment outcomes and smooth the transition from education, through vocational training, to employment.

The Education Committee has rightly identified many key groups of disadvantaged learners. However, the Committee should also focus on the challenges facing young carers, children educated at home, and young carers. The implications for CEIAG in wide variation in learning, skills, training and job opportunities around the country, and particularly deprived areas, needs to be considered.

Those in care, NEETs and others with disadvantages and vulnerabilities often have chaotic, haphazard lives, and are often not in education settings, or even missing from council registers. This is a situation greatly exacerbated by the Covid pandemic. The Children’s Commissioner, the CSJ think tank, and Education Select Committee have identified 100,000 missing or ‘ghost’ children. It is vital for the new CEIAG duty needed to extend to and reach these missing children to support them back into education, training, and employment, preventing them from being NEET to avoid abuse and exploitation.

Shaw Trust runs programmes for young people who are not in education, employment or training, or at risk of it. We also support young people leaving care who face major labour market inequalities that are being worsened by the pandemic through innovative supported accommodation.

In a paper from January this year, researchers from Sheffield Hallam University explored the barriers affecting a young care leaver’s access to sustainable destination routes, and identified a worrying dilemma marking the transition from care settings to independent living for many young people: “Some young people prioritise immediate housing needs over employment…and significant financial stress can make it problematic to sustain training/education…The sudden cope with both and the emotional and practical upheavals of adapting to living alone, are major challenges”[4].

Key to improving education, training and employment outcomes for young people leaving care, is integrated, joined up, wrap around support for their transition to adulthood. In particular, care leavers need to be supported to study and/or find fulfilling, rewarding employment, in order to avert the NEET risk they face. We seek to deliver CEIAG in our innovative, integrated care leavers and broader children and young people’s provision. Providing high quality careers education and advice is vital for children in care and young people leaving care, to support them into good learning and skills courses, training and employment. Providing these services in residential settings is often very challenging, and there is often no funding for it.

The Education Committee should also focus on the challenges facing young carers, and children educated at home. With the implications for CEIAG of wide variation in learning, skills, training and job opportunities around the country, and particularly deprived areas, need be considered by the Committee’s inquiry. Research by the Labour Party in February last year revealed that 292 young people have lost their jobs each day since Rishi Sunak be­came chancellor, yet the Kickstart scheme has created only 13 jobs a day since its launch. Regional Kickstart disparities have also been highlighted. It created fewer than 500 actual starting posts in the north-east of England by April this year.

Those who have a special educational need or disability

As the Youth Employment Group’s Disability Subgroup notes, disabled people experience significantly higher rate of unemployment and economic inactivity compared to non-disabled people[5]. In a challenging job market, past research suggests that disabled people are more likely to be adversely affected[6]. Disabled young people face a double barrier of much greater competition for jobs for young people and ongoing disability discrimination.

EHCP provide some much needed structure to CEIAG and progression pathways for SEND pupils. However, SEND pupils without an EHCP face more problems in being guided on the options available to them, and supported with their progression. Shaw Trust is calling for the welcome expansion of Supported Internships for SEND pupils to include those without an EHCP.

How the Government can ensure more young people have access to a professional and independent careers advisor and increase the take-up of the Lifetime Skills initiative

NEETs, pupils with SEND and other disadvantages and vulnerabilities need to be provided with careers advice that leads them to pathways to Level 1 and 2 vocational qualifications, vital steppingstones to the Lifetime Skills Guarantee entitlement to a first Level 3 qualification. Shaw Trust is also genuinely concerned that there is currently not enough emphasis on qualifications at this level which are vital stepping stones and pathways to further learning and high quality jobs and careers, particularly for learners with SEND.

How careers and skills guidance could be better embedded in the curriculum across primary, secondary, further, higher and adult education, to prepare for the world of work

High quality CEIAG needs to start at primary school, and continue through people’s lives, including for older workers needing to re/up-skill. Shaw Trust advocates for, and seeks to deliver, a ‘Child to Career’ approach to support at key life stages, from school through to career support for displaced older workers, focused on prevention of problems and progress through to fulfilling careers.

Shaw Education Trust (SET, a Multi Academy Trust within our Group) is currently developing a prototype of Child to Career CEIAG to roll out in our educational institutions, as well as offering it to the sector more broadly, through Optimus Education, another part of the Shaw Trust Group, specialising in educational training and development.

This approach recognises that access to good employment - especially for those disadvantaged by disability and/or social, economic and health inequalities - is critically dependent on what happens from the start of people’s lives, and providing continuity of support from then onwards, particularly at key transition points. The labour market impacts of the Covid pandemic have highlighted the need for high quality CEIAG throughout life.

There should be no end age for CEIAG due to the changing world of work, and displaced older workers. In particular, the labour market impacts of the Covid pandemic have highlighted this need for high quality CEIAG throughout life.

Whether National Skills Service is best placed in DfE and DWP to avoid duplication

How schools could be supported to better fulfil their duties to inform students of technical, as well as academic, pathways

To support a Child to Career approach, and for the government’s Plan for Jobs and Skills for Jobs White Paper to be fully effective, there needs to be join up between government programmes, and the departments that commission them.

A key way for this to be achieved is through better collaboration between DfE and DWP. This should aim to achieve seamless ‘skills for jobs’ solutions to increase opportunity and growth through lifelong learning, breaking down silos and bridging gaps between traineeships, apprenticeships, careers advice, the Kickstart scheme, job searching and permanent work.

The relationship between DfE and DWP programmes, Youth, Careers and Family Hubs and funding streams should be reviewed to better connect education, skills, and employment policy around young people, tailored to local labour market conditions, particularly in for the most disadvantaged and vulnerable and in the deprived areas.

Does National Careers Service provide value for money to the taxpayer, and what should relationship with CEIAG be?

NCS provides standardised, impartial, high quality assured, regulated, one to one career guidance, which can join up support to transition young people into adulthood. Apart from a few callers to our helpline (which is open to those aged 13 and over), the NCS only has contact with those aged 18 and over. However, the NCS model could be expanded to support pupils/learners with its high quality careers advice from an earlier age.

The vital role of CEIAG in addressing impacts of Covid

It is vital that the CEIAG duty and provision going forward responds to the key impacts of the Covid pandemic on learning loss, missing children and young people, the move to digital/online learning, and long term scarring from youth unemployment. The skills and labour markets, particularly for young people, have also been profoundly affected by the Covid pandemic, and CEIAG will also need to respond to this.

In particular, sectors that provide first, entry level jobs for young people such as leisure and hospitality have been shut by lockdowns, and this could happen again in the event of further Covid waves. Research shows that many young people experienced unemployment during the pandemic, and many older workers have exited the workforce. Extensive, high quality, lifelong CEIAG will therefore be vital to prevent long term scarring effects on young people, and to support older workers back into the workforce.

March 2022