In England only “one in three disadvantaged students gaining very good GCSE grades, compared with more than 60% of their wealthier peers. As a consequence, almost one million young people are currently not in education, employment or training.” (https://www.futurefrontiers.org.uk). One organisation in England is tackling this through a career mentoring programme for year 11 school pupils. It matches every pupil to a career coach for ten sessions of coaching and employer engagement (a form of mentoring) that aims to equip them with the information, skills, and mind-set to realise their career aspirations and maintain the motivation to achieve their full potential. The aim is to create long term engagement at school by developing pupils’ aspirations and build practical connections to their education. The programme has recently been evaluated to ascertain the impact on participants. This paper discusses this evaluation which used a quasi-experimental design with a control group and found significant increases in career readiness, thinking about work, talking about work and thinking about school.
