Tees Valley Careers is a Careers Hub and has a dedicated careers team that works with and supports all schools and colleges to implement high-quality careers guidance, to help young people make more informed decisions around their future choices.
Our role is to link schools and colleges with Tees Valley employers, building networks with volunteers from business (Enterprise Advisers), supporting Career Leaders by providing training and sharing best practice to enable them to progress towards achieving the Gatsby Benchmarks and also ensure they are in line with the new Ofsted statutory guidelines for careers.
Launched by the Tees Valley Mayor, Tees Valley Careers is an ambitious £3million initiative, which is the first of its kind in the UK. It will target 100,000 young people in Tees Valley and will see every school and college in the area work with local businesses to help shape and deliver careers and enterprise education.
The aim is to have more than 1,000 businesses engage with 11-18-year-olds to directly inform them of job opportunities and career information with the aim of each child receiving seven direct and meaningful employer engagements. This direct contact will help a young person make key decisions regarding their future career pathway and help build their confidence and knowledge of the labour market. This direct employer engagement could also directly lead to a future employment offer.
Research shows that pupils that receive four or more meaningful engagements with employers between the ages of 11-16 years are 86% less likely to be unemployed or not in education, employment and training and on average earn 22% more.
Click here to view the Careers Hub Provider Access Policy.
A key strand of Tees Valley Careers is to ensure that all young people in Tees Valley receive a consistent careers offer regardless of the education establishment they attend. This offer will help them make informed and impartial career choices post 16 and 18 and help in the decision-making process of subject choices at Year 9.
Tees Valley Careers will provide resources and support for schools and colleges to deliver the pledge. As a result, every young person during their seven years in education between ages 11-18 in Tees Valley will have the opportunity to:
Tees Valley Combined Authority’s skills strategy was first published in 2018 and titled “Inspiring Our Future: Our 2018-21 plan to build the skills we need for a modern economy”.
It was updated in 2022 and you can download your copy of the latest version here.
The Tees Valley Mayor and Tees Valley Combined Authority are committed to transforming careers education for all. Inspiring our young people and adults to aspire and expect access to a great career is critical to help our residents achieve their dreams and lead fulfilling lives. Ensuring we improve careers education for all will result in more people making great choices regarding study options, skills development and accessing progressive jobs. In turn, improved skill levels, higher achievement rates and better employment decisions directly linked to available jobs will sustain, grow and attract ambitious businesses to Tees Valley.
Supporting our schools, wider education establishments and partners to provide high-quality careers education will be key. Increasing and widening the number of employers directly engaging with our young people and adults to provide real life examples of work and information about what skills they are looking for is critical to achieving success.
Our plan is to:
The Combined Authority cannot achieve this alone and hopes that as many partners, stakeholders, businesses and schools as possible engage to assist us. To contact us directly to explore how you can help, please email join@teesvalleycareers.com
