Career Advice
Rye College is proud to work with Thrive Careers, who provide all of our impartial advice and guidance. All students in Year 11 receive a 1:1 careers guidance meeting to support their post-16 choices and all students in year 9 take part in group guidance interviews to support their decisions around GCSE choices.
In addition to this, support is also provided through CXK Services: Youth Employability Service for students who are uncertain of their next steps. Students are referred to YES by Rye College, which is followed by additional guidance meetings and other support.
There are also a number of different websites that provide excellent information and advice for students, parents and carers:
Careers East Sussex
Helps you to make the right career choices, whether you are a young person, an adult, an employer or a professional. Explore courses, apprenticeships, projects and research as well as accessing links to other services and support
National Careers Service
Careers advice - job profiles, information and resources.
Find out how to make career decisions at different stages of your life with personalised guidance and resources. Explore over 800 job profiles, skills assessment, courses and more.
icould
Career ideas and information for your future. Explore real-life career videos by job type or subject. Get tips on GCSE options, apprenticeships, university, finding work and more.
Make The Future Yours!
A free careers magazine for young people - full of useful information, interviews and advice to help you make the right career choices.
Skills for Life
Skills for Careers (education.gov.uk) breaks down the training and education choices that are out there for you, all in one place. Learn more about T Levels, which mix classroom and on-the-job training so you can get a feel of a workplace. Or an Apprenticeship, so you can earn and learn at the same time. Or there are Higher Technical Qualifications which are teaching all the new skills that employers are looking for.
Labour Market Information
Labour market information (LMI) informs students about local or national demand for different skills and from different industries. LMI can inform students;
- Which jobs are likely to be easiest or hardest to find in your area
- Which are the big employers in different areas and which ones have jobs on offer
- What skills employers are looking for and which are in short supply
- How much you can expect to be paid in specific jobs
- What working conditions are like
- What qualifications will be most helpful if you want a certain career
- What the jobs of the future might look like and which jobs might disappear
All students and parents should have access to high-quality information about future study options and labour market opportunities.
By the age of 14, all students at Rye College will have accessed and used information about career paths and the labour market to help inform their own decisions on study options and KS4 study choices.
We encourage families to access and use Labour Market information (LMI) to support their children in making choices about their futures.
Use the Careerometer below to access to current labour market information.
Please find some useful links below to support information:
LMI Newsletter June - August 2024
A helpful overview of what Labour Market Information is and why it is important.
Careers East SussexLMI available in the East Sussex Area with lots of useful videos and resources. Emsi Analyst PDF ExportAn Economic Overview of East Sussex by EMSI– the report shows the key demographics, industry characteristics and growth areas, trends, jobs and skills in demand and wage breakdowns.CV writing
Whether you’re thinking of applying for work experience, an entry-level job or a school leaver training programme, chances are you’ll need to put together a CV. This is a standard part of the application process and helps to give employers a clear idea of whether your written communication skills are up to scratch. Your CV needs to be easy to read and understand; it should cover all the necessary information and shouldn’t include any howlers, such as spelling mistakes, that will put the recruiter off.
There is no one right way to put together a CV. There are some standard headings that you will find useful and there are some common errors you need to avoid. However, you can adapt the format to suit you and reflect your strengths. A CV is a personal document and everybody’s CV is different.
You should also update your CV for each job application and adapt it to show you have the qualities and qualifications the employer is looking for.
What should you include?
Our example CV will give you ideas and help you get started. It has notes on the level of detail you need to include, how your CV might evolve over time, and some optional extras.
This is the basic information you need to cover:
- Personal details and contact information – this is essential.
- Education – again, essential. Our CV uses ‘Education and qualifications’ as a heading. If you have done a relevant training course you could highlight this by using ‘Training’ as a separate heading.
- Employment history and work experience – another must-have. You could present this as two separate sections.
- Voluntary work. You could give this its own separate heading, create a ‘Work experience and voluntary work’ section, or give details of your voluntary work in your 'Interests' section.
- Skills. When you are describing your work experience and voluntary activities, look for ways to highlight skills such as communication and teamworking. If you have specific relevant skills you can draw attention to them by putting them in a section of their own.
- Strengths and achievements. You could give these a section of their own, or cover them in the other sections.
And a few don’ts…
- Most importantly of all, don’t lie. If you’re found out you could lose your job and, even worse, in some cases you might be liable for criminal prosecution.
- Don’t waffle. Your CV should be no longer than two pages and at this stage it’s more likely to be one page, as in our example. You can use bullet points and you don’t have to use full sentences.
- Don’t be too fancy or too informal. Describe what you can do in a direct, confident way. Use a professional-looking font such as Times New Roman, Arial, Verdana and Cambria.
- Check your spelling and grammar and get somebody you trust to read your CV and check it again. Employers spend 30 seconds on average scanning a CV, so make sure you don’t give them any reasons to reject you.
Read through our example CV and then change it into your own: