This Spring, ORT UK ran an ORT JUMP Working Skills Day in six schools, enabling hundreds of Year 10 and Year 12 students to explore a selection of exciting industries and identify the skills sought by today’s employers.

Experts from a variety of fields from TV production, business development, law, retail and many more, led interactive workshops. In small groups, students could try their hand at creative thinking, strategic planning, negotiation and pitching amongst other skills that are integral to so many jobs and yet not part of the school curriculum.

Students were encouraged to network with our facilitators, to discuss pathways into their industries and to find out, first-hand, what their work entails.

It was an eye-opening experience for the participants, who learnt that careers paths are rarely linear and that there are a multitude of options out there ready to be explored. The sessions gave the students confidence in their abilities outside of traditional subjects and left them excited for the future.

The ORT JUMP Working Skills Day is one of four ORT JUMP Employability Skills Programmes and was created due to the success of the ORT JUMP Mentoring Programme. To find out more about our programmes, please visit ORT JUMP | ORT UK or email jump@ortuk.org