Latest News
Leonardo Project
The Connexions South London Sub Regional Unit received funding from Leonardo to run a mobility project sending Personal Advisers from South London to Denmark and Sweden to learn how they tackle various issues surrounding youth unemployment. The project was a mutual learning experience as we both sent and hosted Youth Workers and Personal Advisers, allowing areas of particular specialist expertise to be covered and experience and knowledge to be shared.
Supporting Parents & Carers
Parents and Carers play a really important role in supporting teenagers. A recent survey by the National Children’s Bureau found that 63% of respondents stated that parents played a key role influencing them on their future career choices.
As part of a pan London approach, Connexions Services have designed a leaflet to help support parents and carers to help support their teenagers.
Please click on the link to download a copy of the leaflet.
New Offices
The RBK-SRU will be moving to new offices located on the 2nd floor at Green Dragon House, 64 High Street, Croydon, CR0 9XN on Friday 26 March 2010. Ayub Khan Director of the RBK-SRU said “we are very pleased to have secured new offices that will better suit our needs as a local authority shared service".
The move will take place on Friday 26 March 2010 and the RBK-SRU will be operational on Monday 29 March 2010 at Green Dragon House.
The contact number from Monday 29 March 2010 will be 020 8649 9810.
Young People's Survey
In January 2010, the Royal Borough of Kingston upon Thames Sub Regional Unit (RBK-SRU) contacted young people to get their views of the Connexions Service operating across South London.
The survey is now complete and initial findings are:
- 80% of respondents have used Connexions to access advice on jobs/careers information.
- The majority of respondents were aged 16 – 18 but there were a significant number that were 19 or above who responded.
- 85% of respondents are in education, employment or training. However there were a significant number of respondents who were not engaged in any form of training, education or employment.
- 74% prefer to receive advice and guidance face to face and electronic methods such as websites and computer packages were also quite popular.
- 88% of respondents are clear on where to go in order to access Connexions Services.
- Whilst the majority of respondents felt that the opening hours of Connexions Centres met their needs, there was a need for some Centres to open longer during the evening.
Ayub Khan, Director of the RBK-SRU said “In any service you need to establish what works well and what aspects need improving. This survey gives us more up to date information about how young people view the service. We will work with our providers to ensure that improvements are put in place and we will continue to ask young people what they think. I would like to take this opportunity to thank the young people who responded and congratulations to Amy Harris and Debra Chilumbi who were both the lucky winners of the iPod Touch.”
Pictured below are Amy and Debra collecting their prizes.
For further information about the survey contact the RBK-SRU.
Choice Jobs Progress Report
The Sub Regional Unit is leading on a Pan London project to help drive up the number of vacancies for young people.
The latest progress report shows a 35% increase on the number of jobs notified to Connexions Services in comparison to 08/09 figures. More local authorities and IAG providers are realising the potential of the Choice Jobs function and have committed to establishing systems and processes to support local employer liaison.
Over 40% of vacancies for London have been provided by the South London Sub- Region.
Marcelle Neil, Choice Jobs Development Manager, commented “it’s such a privilege to contribute to this area of work, especially in such uncertain times for young people.”
The Sub Regional Unit is also involved in a National Apprenticeships Service project with Connexions which is due to run until March 2010. This project is primarily involved with increasing uptake of Apprenticeships and focuses on employer engagement as well as working with young people highlighting the benefits of an Apprenticeship.
For more information on either of these projects please contact Marcelle Neil:
marcelleneil@connexionssru.org.uk
National Apprenticeship Week 2010
National Apprenticeship Week will take place from Monday 1 February to Friday 5 February 2010. The Week, which is organised and coordinated by the National Apprenticeship Service, will celebrate the talents and skills of apprentices from across the UK. It will see apprentices, employers, providers and wider stakeholders showcase the benefits of Apprenticeship programmes and the value apprentices bring to organisations they work for.
National and regional activities will be taking place throughout the Week and each day will have a different focus. Following the success of Apprenticeship Week 2009, activities this year will include agenda-setting media features, employer events, job swaps, breakfast briefings and apprentice challenges.
The main purpose of the Week is to engage employers with Apprenticeships by highlighting the advantages of employing and supporting apprentices in the workplace. The Week will also demonstrate the wide range of Apprenticeships available, including opportunities in the public sector.
More information on Apprenticeship Week will be available soon at http://www.apprenticeships.org.uk.
Helping to Improve our Services
In January 2010, the Sub Regional Unit will be seeking the views of 13 – 19 year olds across South London to tell us what they think of the Connexions Service currently being delivered. The survey will ask young people to complete a simple questionnaire and the results will be published in February 2010.
Ayub Khan, Director of the SRU, said:
"It is vital that we get the views of young people as they use the service. If it is good or bad we need to know so that we can work with our providers to put in place improvements and build on what works well. We hope that young people take time to respond with their views".
For further information about the survey please contact the SRU.
Information, Advice and Guidance Strategy Launched
On Monday, Ministers published a strategy for young people’s information advice and guidance titled Quality, Choice and Aspiration. The Strategy brings together a range of policies into a document that explains the Department for Children’s Schools and Families intentions to better support young people to help them progress.
The key points contained in the strategy are:
- The Government's ambition that every young person will get careers education up to the age of 18 in line with raising the participation age.
- Pilot approaches to teaching about careers in primary school and plans for primary schools to work with universities to give younger pupils an experience of higher education and the wider world of work .
- An aspiration that that every young person will have access to a mentor .
- Better online access to careers advice through Face book, You Tube, blogs and forums and a new dedicated online mentoring scheme from 2010 to enable young people to contact professionals online.
- More help for disadvantaged and disabled young people in accessing work experience.
- Support and resource for schools and parents to engage with young people from an early age to talk about career opportunities.
- £10m nationally to support innovative ways of delivering careers education.
Ayub Khan Director at the RBK-SRU commented that “the strategy has been a long awaited document but essentially is good news for young people. It places a big emphasis on local authorities to improve their services which will raise the quality of advice and guidance. In South London we have a strong foundation of good Careers Education, Information Advice & Guidance services in place but there is always more to do and our approach working with Personal Advisers continually assessing their professional practice will be critical to that improvement agenda”.
Published alongside the Strategy is the Careers Education: Statutory Guidance for Schools, which sets out expectations for the impartial Careers Education young people should receive between the ages of 11 and 16.
A further document the Statutory Guidance and Directions for Local Authorities, to be published in April 2010, will make clear DCSF expectations of local authority’s role in delivering improvements in the CEIAG available to young people within their area. These will be based on the widely supported IAG Quality Standards.
To download a copy of the strategy click on the following link:
Quality, Choice and Aspiration.
ESF Event
On 1st October 2009 the Sub Regional Unit held a successful event at the Croydon Park Hotel to celebrate and review the progress of our European Social Fund projects aimed at helping young people across South London remain in education, employment and training.
The event provided an opportunity to hear of some powerful case studies on how the programmes were making a real difference to the lives of young people who without this support would not be participating in education or training.
The event also gave participants and young people an opportunity to discuss ways in which the programmes can be improved for the future.
Robb Cunningham ESF Projects Coordinator commented that “the day was a successful event and the opportunity given to network and share ideas on how to improve projects was valued by all who attended. We want to say thank you for the hard work by Personal Advisers and Project Workers in getting the programmes set up and running”
For further information about ESF programmes please contact robbcunningham@connexionssru.org.uk
Continuing Education
With young people celebrating the achievement of GCSE’s, the number of planned places available for them to study at Further Education Colleges or School Forms in South London has increased compared to this time last year according to figures published by the Department for Children Schools and Families (DCSF).
Commenting on the news Ayub Khan, Director of the Connexions South London Sub Regional Unit, said that “This is good news. Any increase in places can only benefit young people. The new term has already started and we would advise young people to continue to get support from a Personal Adviser whilst they stay in education, employment or training through either the local Connexions Centres across South London or the College or School Sixth Form where they are studying”.
Access the website at http://www.connexionssru.org.uk/centres to find a Connexions Centre in Bromley, Croydon, Kingston, Merton, Richmond or Sutton.
News Archive
May 2010 (1)
April 2010 (1)
March 2010 (2)
February 2010 (1)
January 2010 (1)
December 2009 (1)
