Written by Miss Sarra Jenkins, Director of Future Pathways

When pupils are considering their future, they can often mistakenly believe they need to think about what career they want. For a Year 7-9 pupil, this is a terrifying prospect! Before they move into a career, they must make their GCSE options, post-16 options, post-18 options and more, all of which makes a ‘career’ seem rather remote. 

Similarly, with the advance of technology, careers may develop in the future that do not currently exist by the time these pupils move into the world of work. The World Economic Forum ‘Futures of Jobs Report 2025’ estimates that two-fifths of existing skill sets will be outdated or transformed between 2025-2030. It’s no wonder that young pupils can find this rather daunting if they are searching for a career. 

Why is early thinking important? 

Given the uncertainty of the future, pupils may think they can delay exploration of their own opportunities until they are in a more senior year. However, one in three pupils starts to consider university whilst they are in primary school and will begin ruling out institutions as options. For the parents of Year 7s who attended Fairfield and are currently reading this, you’ll likely realise that this is why I ran the inaugural ‘Fairfield Futures’ event last year. Early thinking about their future is crucial as pupils may be accumulating unhelpful stereotypes if they delay their exploration. 

So, what can your son meaningfully do in Years 7-9 to help them think about their future? 

Be curious 

Boys in Years 7-9 have a wealth of opportunities here at Loughborough Grammar School, both inside and outside of the classroom. The range of subjects available in these years is important as it allows pupils to really consider what they enjoy and – more importantly – why they enjoy it. They can use this enjoyment as a catalyst to try and find activities related to their favourite subjects   – this might be a club in school, listening to a podcast, or taking part in competitions that they find. 

They can also try new things beyond the classroom to explore other passions that may lie dormant or yet undiscovered. From Bee Club to creative writing, there is so much that pupils can try. The Thomas Burton Award is designed to encourage boys to explore these options, but of course, they can explore more clubs than the award requires. Similarly, beyond the school gates, boys can explore free online courses, TED talks and more to find new and engaging areas of interest. 

This curiosity helps to shape the choices that pupils go on to make, as well as helping build their communication, resilience and teamwork skills. When pupils understand their skill strengths this can help them make better choices as they occur. 

Do research 

Given that pupils can accumulate stereotypes about certain institutions, careers or jobs, one of the ways to combat this is through research. Researching specific universities, apprenticeships or other routes can seem rather nebulous for a Year 7-9, so what else can they do? 

All boys at LGS have a Unifrog account. On here there are two fabulous tools to help them research, and they operate in a similar way – the ‘Careers Library’ and ‘Subject Library’. If pupils click on these tools and scroll down, they will see they can enter their three favourite school subjects and hit ‘Go’. This will return either subjects or careers, depending which tool you are in, that are aligned to these subjects. It’s really useful for getting pupils to consider areas they may not have even heard of, and if they come across subjects or careers that interest them, they can save them to their ’favourites’ so they are easily accessible from the menu at the very top of the page in future. They can redo this as many times as they wish so as their tastes change, so can their searches. 

Keep a record 

Record-keeping is helpful for boys exploring options. This does not have to be an onerous task, nor a ‘Dear Diary’ account. Rather, keeping a brief record of what activities they do, when they started (and stopped, if applicable), and what skills they learnt can be useful. It helps pupils to better identify the skills they have and allows them to see their own development of interests, both of which help to inform effective decision-making at key points. 

Understand it’s about the next step 

Finally, it is important for pupils to understand that thinking about their future isn’t always about where they will be in ten or twenty years. More often, it is about thinking, “What is my next step?” Pupils cannot know all the possibilities that lie ahead. Instead, they can focus on the choices they face now, all of which can help have a positive impact on their future careers.  Which co-curricular club might allow them to develop a new skill? Which subject that Unifrog brought up do they want to do more research about? Which subject do they want to try in Year 8? 

Crucially, understanding it is their ‘next step’ can remove some of the pressure and can allow boys to explore more widely by emphasising they aren’t expected to know every answer at this stage, or where they want to be in ten years’ time. 

So, what’s your ‘next step?’