Question to the Department for Education:

To ask the Secretary of State for Education, if she will provide support to schools and colleges to help prepare minority ethnic young people to transition into work.

High-quality careers information, advice and guidance is key to helping all young people make informed decisions about their future, including being able to find out about and consider the different options available to them.

The department funds the Careers and Enterprise Company (CEC) to support schools and colleges to deliver high-quality careers programmes, to increase young people’s exposure to the world of work and to smooth the transition into their next step.

The support provided by CEC is universal and provides young people in every part of the country, no matter what their background, with high-quality, tailored advice and guidance. Secondary schools are expected to develop and improve their careers provision for young people in line with the world-class Gatsby Benchmarks, including benchmark 3 which focuses on addressing the individual needs of each pupil.

To support schools to address the individual needs of each pupil, in September 2021 CEC launched the Future Skills Questionnaire (FSQ), which is a student self-completion questionnaire that measures career readiness at points of transition across secondary education. Careers Leaders in secondary schools use FSQ insights to identify those students that require additional support in making their next career learning choice.

Careers Hubs in the 2023/24 academic year are providing additional funding to deliver three distinct strands of activity focused on supporting more disadvantaged pupils:

• High-quality work experience for up to 15,000 young people with the greatest economic disadvantage.
• Experiences with 20 employers from key growth sectors for up to 5,000 young people with a guarantee of a high-quality mock interview.
• Virtual experiences for year 7 to 9 pupils in up to 600 institutions in coastal and rural areas.