Ofsted: Schools and colleges must improve ‘poor’ careers advice

Schools and colleges have been criticised by Ofsted for “poor” levels of collaboration in ensuring students from disadvantaged backgrounds have good careers advice.

A new report called ‘navigating post-16 careers guidance: supporting learners from lower socioeconomic backgrounds’ also found many colleges offer “rudimentary” careers advice, with few deprived students receiving tailored advice.

Inspectors believe good guidance is an “essential tool” for opening doors to meaningful career opportunities for students from this group, who appear to be represented at higher rates in FE colleges.

But most students told inspectors and researchers they “could not remember” careers guidance at school, with most choosing FE colleges based on their peers’ choices or because of its convenient location.

College leaders also reported that more students than ever are enrolling “without any idea” of courses or careers they wanted to pursue, placing more pressure on staff to provide advice.

Despite the concerns, around four fifths of students felt “supported and well prepared” for their next step after college and said careers guidance made them “more confident and resilient”.

Careers advisors – both specialists and college staff – were “central” to them developing knowledge and skills for their next steps.

Lee Owston, Ofsted’s national director for education, said: “We know how beneficial careers guidance is for all students, particularly those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds who may need more support to achieve their career aspirations.

“It’s reassuring to hear that, despite the challenges, students were very positive about the guidance they received post-16.”

Recommendations include finding better definitions and guidance to help identify students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds, further study of what careers guidance works best, improve collaboration with schools, and investigating less traditional work placements that would appeal to employers and benefit more learners.

The report is based on 28 research visits to FE colleges, sixth form colleges and secondary schools, holding discussions with principals, careers advisors, 250 students from lower socioeconomic backgrounds and a survey of 241 parents from the schools and colleges.

It is the third in a series of studies of careers guidance that that DfE commissioned Ofsted to produce since 2022.

Here are a few key findings:

Go beyond ‘tick box’

The report praised colleges with an “overarching” careers strategy involving collaboration between employers, teaching staff and careers advisors, and found that careers guidance worked best when it was integrated into a course rather than an isolated provision.

However, it added: “For too many, the careers offer was ad-hoc and generic – more of a tick-box exercise than something designed to meet the career expectations of students, particularly those from lower socioeconomic backgrounds.”

Even those with a more varied range of careers activities were often “rudimentary and lacked coherence”.

Those doing better work had a strategic plan that tended to successfully collect information about students facing “financial hardship” at enrolment and made strong links with students’ careers aspirations, meaningful work experience and work or study options after college.

In some cases, work experience included industry workers coming in to teach lessons or teachers returning to work in their industry as part of their professional development.

Information sharing woes

Colleges reported it was “difficult” to collaborate with schools their students come from, making it harder to identify students from lower economic backgrounds.

The report said: “College leaders were particularly concerned about limited data sharing from schools, which they told us sometimes prevents effective collaboration.”

But inspectors found that none of the college leaders were aware of the Department for Education’s get information about pupil (GIAP) service and few matched postcodes with deprivation data to assess which students could benefit from more support.

Lower socioeconomic backgrounds not always priority

Many colleges told researchers that they did not have specific careers guidance for lower socioeconomic groups because they considered most 16- to- 18-year-olds are “disadvantaged in some way”.

While some do target some specific groups that are “disadvantaged” – such as those with special needs or have been in care – these learners often benefitted from additional funding streams.

Some leaders were also concerned about labelling students “and potentially lowering expectations”.

But researchers Ofsted are “concerned” that many students are only receiving “generic careers guidance” which is “of variable quality” and does not meet students’ expectations.

Recruitment 

However, colleges and local authorities are “struggling to recruit” qualified level 6 careers advisors due to a shortage of staff, so find other ways to “plug the gaps” such as through untrained but experienced staff.

Work experience

Most colleges reported a shortage of work experience placements for level 1 and 2 courses or T Levels due to the timing and supply in the local area.

This put students from a lower socioeconomic background “at a further disadvantage”, as they often struggled to afford to travel further from the college, live in areas with fewer placements and lack family members with knowledge or contacts to organise relevant placements.

Since the Covid pandemic, many businesses have moved to virtual working making it even harder to find placements.

The report praised colleges that have moved away from “box-ticking” work experience to more flexible ways to involve employers, such as careers fairs, guest talks, alumni-run workshops and visits to workplaces.

‘We will strengthen careers education’

A spokesperson for the Department for Education, which guides national policy on careers guidance and funds both the National Careers Service and the Careers & Enterprise Company (CEC), said: “This government is determined to break down barriers to opportunity for all our young people and transform their life chances.

“This will help open up more opportunities for people from all backgrounds to access the skills and training they need to succeed.

“We’re determined to change the fact that many young people leave school without accessing work experience and expert careers advice.

“So we will offer two weeks’ worth of work experience for every young person and improve careers advice in schools and colleges. 

“Through our new Youth Guarantee every 18-21-year-old in England will have help to access an apprenticeship, quality training and education opportunities or help to find a job.”

A spokesperson for the CEC, which supports schools and colleges to deliver ‘21st century careers education’, said: “For our part, we will continue to work to strengthen careers education in FE through careers hubs (which have been shown to make a difference) and wider partners.

“We will also seek to develop initiatives targeted at disadvantaged young people, like the Effective Transition Project, which has helped learners find secure destinations.”