The Milburn report makes it clear that the plight of young people not in education, employment or training (Neet) is a major issue.

One cause of this, which many schools will recognise, is young people struggling to see how education connects to their future - this leaves them disengaged and without a clear sense of direction.

Our school is in a small market town with limited commercial activity, so this issue is prevalent.

Tackling the Neet issue head-on

However, preventing students from becoming Neet is a core leadership focus for us, and we work hard to show that education is the key to opening up the world beyond the one they’re growing up in.

To do this we have built a robust careers programme based on the Gatsby Benchmarks that aims to give young people ambition, a sense of purpose and a clear focus for what comes next.

This has meant prioritising careers guidance and, as a result, over the past three years our Neet figure for our leavers has continued to decline and is now below 1 per cent.

Many of our students previously lacked ambition and aspiration, so it was vital that we provided them with clear goals, purpose and direction for their future.

Our careers programme has enabled students to develop this focus, raising aspirations and helping them to understand the pathways and opportunities available to them.

What’s more, in doing this we have seen clear improvements in behaviour, attendance, wellbeing, inclusion and attainment - an example of which is outlined later in this article.

This focus on careers guidance has been central to moving our school from a “requires improvement” Ofsted rating to “good” within just two years under the old inspection framework.

Making careers a cross-school priority

So, how have we achieved this?

For a careers programme to deliver impact, it must be a strategic priority across the whole school - not something that just falls to the careers leader.

Every member of staff needs to understand why careers guidance matters and their role within it. We give training to all our teachers, so they feel equipped and excited about their part in the careers programme.

The training is highly practical and is designed to help staff fully understand what effective careers education looks like, the key employability skills that employers value, and what the Gatsby Benchmarks are and how they can be implemented.

We also make time for our staff to get up-to-date information from online careers platforms on the rapidly evolving labour market to ensure that the information they share with students is relevant and accurate.

Bringing in experts

Each teacher also links their subject to the wider world of careers, so that our young people understand the broad range of career options available from studying that subject.

For example, our business and media students heard from a LEGO designer about careers in online advertising, branding and digital marketing, while representatives from Arsenal Football Club spoke about the importance of modern foreign languages and how language skills are valuable across careers within the sports industry

The local community is also a vital partner: local businesses have brought in role models to talk to our young people, offered meaningful work experience placements and mentoring, and have taken part in our careers fairs.

We have a strong partnership, including with AHSE, a construction company, which has come in to talk about different career pathways within its industry, as well as with local funeral directors, hair and beauty providers and the Rotary Club, which supports our careers programme.

We also work closely with our local careers hub, drawing on its expertise and contacts - it helps us to identify gaps in our provision and focus more clearly on what is working well.

It helped us to identify which Gatsby Benchmarks were not yet being fully met, and supported us in developing practical strategies to address these gaps. The careers hub also shared examples of effective practice from other schools.

One student’s story

A great example of all this coming together is with one of our students. Kelsey despised coming to school, and we could see that reflected in her attendance figures and behavioural incidents.

However, a career skills intervention with ZSL Whipsnade Zoo (a new partner) when she was in Year 9 was a turning point.

The programme, aimed at students who are disengaged from education and with a high risk of becoming Neet, took Kelsey out of the classroom environment one a day a week for six weeks.

Seeing all the roles on offer at the zoo, she could begin to picture what she might want to do and understand what would be required of her. The experience gave her belief that she could see herself in that sort of role.

From there, our careers programme built on that experience and nurtured that spark by mapping out a clear, achievable pathway towards a career she feels confident about.

In turn, she’s attending school, engaging in lessons and has ambition to do well in her GCSEs to then go to college, which she hopes will take her to an apprenticeship at the zoo.

When careers guidance is a genuine strategic priority, the impact is clear: fewer young people become Neet and more, like Kelsey, find their purpose.

Karen Hayward is the executive principal at Sandy Secondary School in Bedfordshire