Over this final half term of the school year, our year 7, 8 and 9 pupils are all going to be taking part in an activity called ‘A day’s work for a day’s pay.’ Each pupil will be given a ‘job’ at random by their form tutor and will be told how much they would get paid each day and each week being employed in that role.​ At the start of the following week, pupil’s  will fill out a payslip showing how much they would have earned in the past week, but this is linked to their school attendance.​ For example, if a pupil is absent for a day at school, they would lose a day’s pay from their job. If they are late to school, they would lose half a day’s pay.​

Pupils will complete a booklet during this activity over the next six weeks and in the first tutor session of each week they will fill in their weekly payslip (based on their attendance during the last week) and complete a short reflection activity. ​In the first of the sessions, pupils will find out what job role they have been given at random and will record how they feel about this and discover how much they can expect to earn daily and weekly.​

During the last week of term, there will be a reward for those with the best attendance at their job.​ Good luck everybody!

Our post 16 year 12 students recently attended the UK University and Apprenticeship search fair at Edgbaston Stadium in Birmingham. This is a twice-yearly event where students get the opportunity to meet representatives from universities and apprenticeship providers from all over the country in one place. They were able to attend seminars and workshops where they found out more about the application processes, what makes a good application and how they can stand out for the crowd and be successful in their applications to universities, employers and apprenticeship providers, as well as meeting with admissions tutors from a huge variety of UK universities all in preparation for their applications in the autumn term of year 13.

Our local Further Education College (Walsall College) recently held assemblies with pupils in years 7 to 10. The focus of these assemblies was to tell our pupils about some of the options that will be available to them at the end of their GCSE courses. This assembly informed us about the new T-Level qualifications that are being offered by colleges nationally in vocational education which also include a large work placement. The college visitors also explained to our pupils how apprenticeships worked and what types of jobs these can lead to in the future, as well as showing examples of the apprenticeship courses that the college offers. Pupils were shown case study videos from current students on both apprenticeship and T-Level courses to find out more about the courses and what they could expect. Walsall college will be back later in the year to attend our careers fair and will be able to talk to pupils on a on to one basis if they have any questions.