Aurora Boveridge College

She tells us about her role and what a typical day looks like:

The role

My main role is to initially help all of our students find meaningful work experience whilst they are here at Boveridge College. This involves talking to students about what they enjoy and what they’d like to do in the future. It also involves maintaining good relationships with a wide range of employees in the local community and beyond, as well as developing new contacts.

For our students, work experience is a vital aspect of their educational programme, giving them an insight into different workplaces and how they operate as well as building their confidence to take that crucial step into the workplace.

Another aspect of my role is ensuring that once students have secured a work experience placement, they’re successful and happy in what they are doing. This means supporting them with transport arrangements to and from their placement and ensuring that employers’ give regular feedback on the progress students are making.

A typical day

A typical day starts around 8am. The first thing I do is check my emails then see which students are out on work experience. I also need to see which staff are attending with the students and ensure offsite activity planners are completed so our students are kept safe.

It’s important that students can get to and from their placement without any issues, so I arrange the transport for them – this doesn’t always go to plan and sometimes I need to call in the maintenance van to help out! I’ll also sometimes take students myself.

Students normally stay for a whole day at their work placement, so I also ensure that everyone gets packed lunches or cooked meal.

Each day I look into securing further placements, researching different industries and exploring contacts to find placements which match with our student’s needs and aspirations.

I then make sure all placements and interactions are recorded accurately on our online platform Unifrog. Unifrog is a careers platform which not only allows us to record information and skills but also allows students to easily explore their interests and what career paths they can take to reach their goals and career options. 

All of our students have the opportunity to meet with Jessica our external level 6 careers advisor, at least once per year.  I liaise with Jess to coordinate all the appointments and ensure they go smoothly.

I love being here and helping students to gain confidence and prepare for the working environment, it is incredibly rewarding to watch them grow and develop. Hopefully I’ll see them all gain a job they’ll really enjoy.