Pupils given poor careers advice

One third of secondary schools in England give their pupils biased and incomplete careers advice, leading them to make the wrong choices about their futures, inspectors have warned. Some of the teachers picked to give careers guidance to 16- to 18-year-olds are chosen because they have spare time in their schedules, rather than because they have up-to-date information on jobs and courses, the schools inspectorate Ofsted found. Pupils are sometimes told careers advice is only relevant for students who are "not capable of going on to university," Ofsted's study – Moving Through the System – discovered. Teenagers in care homes and in foster care – those most in need of well-informed advice – receive the worst careers guidance. Inspectors found those who give careers advice to teenagers in care may not even have the dates of birth of the young people they are in charge of and are unaware of which qualifications the teenagers already have. In six of the 14 children's homes and in five of the eight foster homes visited, careers advisers knew so little they could not raise teenagers' aspirations, Ofsted said. In seven of the children's homes, staff "had no knowledge of the options available to 16-year-olds and did not know who might be able to offer the necessary advice and support". In six of the 18 secondary schools the inspectors visited, careers advisers had "too little knowledge and understanding of the full range of options" available to young people. The inspectors were concerned at the degree of "completeness and impartiality of the advice offered," the study said. However, inspectors praised careers advice in schools for teenagers with special needs. The Association of School and College Leaders (ASCL) said schools and colleges need clearer, more up-to-date information about the full range of employment and training options available to young people to provide high-quality careers advice. Brian Lightman, general secretary-elect of ASCL, said: "Providing impartial careers advice is becoming increasingly complex. There are an ever growing number of routes into further education, training and employment and schools and colleges can find it difficult to keep up to date." Meanwhile, a group of leading educationalists warn today that the education sytem is "in danger of ruining lives". The New Vision Group, a group of academics led by Sir Tim Brighouse, the former commissioner for London schools, recommends that the "bewildering variety of secondary schools are simplified and reduced" and attacks Tory plans to create a new form of parent-run schools. Brighouse said: "The slavish adherence to promoting 'choice' and 'diversity' is leading to unforeseen and undesirable consequences. It is harder to help the 10 to 15% who benefit least from the system and are in danger of ruining their lives and those of others. "Expanding popular schools or building new ones ... can inadvertently lead to surplus places, inefficiency and even inequity of access. Moreover, some element of planning of the overall provision of school places in a locality reduces unforeseen risks and excess cost. The system should be encouraged to act for the common good, but instead is drifting to whatever the sum of individual autonomous schools and colleges may add up to." Brighouse said education was in danger of being treated as a commodity, rather than a service. As a commodity, it "offers escape routes for the majority, but leaves a minority picking up the scraps in a disintegrating system," he said. The group is calling for government to save £1.5bn by scrapping quangos including the Qualifications and Curriculum Development Agency, which designs the curriculum.