ELBA’s Education Ambassador Network launches

This month saw the start of ELBA’s Education Ambassador Network, a new initiative aimed at supporting education and schools in east London by strengthening career guidance and employee engagement with the students that need it the most.

Ambassadors will be individuals from across the ELBA community who will offer opportunities to engage with, and learn from, employees, specifically targeted at students who don’t access the same opportunities as their peers. The Education Works team held the initial scoping session at the end of March, with representatives from Standard Chartered, Accenture, Fitch Ratings, Ince Gordon Dadds and KPMG along with the Head of Careers from Greatfields School. We were also thrilled to have a guest speaker, Martin Rogers from the Education and Employers Taskforce. Martin shared some of the research around how targeting employer engagement activities to these students is so invaluable. We know that building connections between students and professionals helps to tackle existing stereotypes that exist around the world of work, such as ‘science isn’t for girls’ or ‘university isn’t for the working classes’, it shows them what they can do.

Research has also shown us the students aspirations are shaped by their friends and family, with 45% of young people planning their careers around the insights gained from their social capital, the parents and family around them. Disadvantaged young people are less likely to have this social capital, further narrowing their perceptions of the careers open to them.

Disadvantaged students are defined as those eligible for free school meals, with a current achievement gap at a standstill, with disadvantaged students currently 18 months behind their peers.

Ambassadors will be supported to target engagement with these groups of disadvantaged students. Our initial research with our schools has built a picture of these students, often classed as the low achievers at school, or even the middle achievers; the students that drift through school, including those students that have been identified as at risk of gang violence. This allows us to understand the beneficiary groups we should be targeting. With training and support from the ELBA Education Works team, we will be working with the Ambassadors and their CSR leads to understand which beneficiary groups they would like to focus their support on, building an expertise of the kind of support best suited.

To ensure this network is impactful for the students and volunteers, we will be putting together a working group of potential Ambassadors and CSR leads to build a fuller picture of the role of an Ambassador and the network, with the first session taking place in June. If anyone is interested in getting involved, contact Kerry – kerry.mulhern@elba-1.org.uk