Business in the Community Regional Education Manager for the North West, Clare Hutchinson is urgently looking for volunteers in the Burnley area to help continue their successful "Business Mentoring Scheme" with Sir John Thursby Community College.
Clare told us:
Year 10 students are paired with volunteers who meet once every three weeks to discuss their future career path. The student and mentor would typically discuss what the student is interested in, talk about their job and how they got into it, discuss with the student how to research jobs and work out the relevant courses they might take and talk about the skills that employers look for and how a student can demonstrate that they have those skills.
The commitment is a full academic year, once every three weeks (excluding the school holidays) which equates to approximately 14 sessions – the final session in June is a celebration event. The sessions take place on Wednesdays from 8.15am to 8.55am to minimise disruption to the mentors work commitments and so that the students are not missing lessons. Whilst we appreciate that there will be occasions when a mentor can’t attend a session, we are looking for people who can broadly commit to this schedule.
I will be providing a training session at the school on Wednesday 8th September from 8.15am to 9am for any new mentors who would like guidance on how to mentor a student – we also provide a mentoring handbook if required.
The programme is very popular with students and the impact on previous students has been fantastic with increased confidence and maturity from students involved, a better understanding of jobs and careers and for some students it has been genuinely life changing.
If you're interested in giving some time to a student at Sir John Thursby this year, please contact Clare.