Mock Interviews for Norlington students with Aviva volunteers

Written by Robin Hawthorn, Senior Project Manager – Education Works

Last month, 16 volunteers from Aviva conducted five mock interviews each for 80 Year 10 students. The aim of these mock interviews is to give students the chance to experience a real interview and become comfortable with this process, as well as improving their interviewing skills. This is an invaluable experience for the students as many, by the time they leave university, do not have any experience of these kinds of interviews which they will need to participate in when entering the jobs market.

During the interview, students were asked competency based questions and given verbal feedback which will be invaluable to take into their first real world interview. Students were also set a task throughout the morning which they tackled in small groups. They had to write and present a SWOT analysis on Aviva and presented it to nine Aviva volunteers who kindly gave up time after the interviews to judge the presentations. All the students gave excellent presentations and it was clear they had thoroughly done their research and worked well as a team.

By the end of the day, students had developed key employability skills such as teamwork, problem solving and creativity during the SWOT analysis and speaking and listening in both the SWOT analysis and the interviews.

Volunteers and students gave wonderful feedback on the activity, reminding us that these activities benefit both the volunteer and the beneficiary:

– Volunteer

– Volunteer

Thank you again to the volunteers from Aviva for taking the time to work with the students and well done to the students who completed their likely first ever interview.

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