Year 9: Your Future Remote Work Experience Project Launch a Huge Success

Inspiring the Next Generation

Following the success of last year’s pilot — which reached 4,274 Year 9 students across the Harris, Ark, Aspiration, Arthur Terry, and Dixons Academy Trusts — we’ve refined and relaunched our offer for 2025. We’re delighted to share that this year’s Year 9: Your Future Remote Work Experience Project is already off to a fantastic start!

Our first opportunity of the year, delivered in partnership with Invictus Multi Academy Trust, saw over 900 students take part — and the feedback has been overwhelmingly positive. Many students described the experience as eye-opening and inspiring, offering a valuable way to explore different career sectors and understand the skills employers are really looking for. 

Bringing Learning to Life

The opportunity was delivered over three immersive mornings of activity and discovery, hosted in collaboration with a range of local and national employers alongside our dedicated Futures For All team. Each session combined skills-based learning with real-world insight, giving students a direct line to professionals across a variety of industries.

Employers discussed their own career journeys, the roles available in their organisations, and how subjects studied in school connect to real workplace skills.

To keep things engaging, students participated in interactive, sector-specific challenges mirroring real industry issues. Working in teams, they brainstormed ideas, developed solutions, and pitched their final concepts back to employers.

The highlight for many was receiving direct feedback from industry experts — an invaluable opportunity that builds confidence, teamwork, and employability skills.

Student Voices 

We asked young people to reflect on their experiences, and key highlights include:  

76% of young people said they understood what skills they already have and what they could develop further. 

71% said they learned about different types of jobs and career pathways in their placement industry. 

61% now feel clearer about the career path they might want to follow — and the same proportion said they feel more confident making choices about their next steps after school. 

78% felt the programme helped them learn more about the skills employers look for. 

All eight Skills Builder Framework competencies achieved agreement scores of 73% or above, with teamwork at 86% and listening at 85% — clear evidence of the programme’s effectiveness in equipping young people with key employability skills. 

Students shared some brilliant reflections on what they enjoyed most: 

“Working in teams and developing new ideas, and getting educated about the industry.”  – Student

“It was interesting hearing some real workers that work on a film set talk about their job.”  – Student

“It was an interactive and informative piece about the NHS and various problems within the organisation and how we could design new health centres.”  – Student

Building Futures Together 

The project’s aim is simple: to help students connect classroom learning with the world of work. By exploring different sectors and identifying the skills that underpin successful careers, students are encouraged to think deeply about their own futures — and how to shape them. It also supports schools in delivering high-quality career education at Key Stage 3, keeping them aligned with the Gatsby Benchmarks of best practice and the new statutory guidance from the Department for Education.

We would like to extend our sincere thanks to our fantastic employer partners — BadBear Games, Creative Portal, Into Film, Jackson Civil Engineering, Joined Up Care, The Grange Spa, Ballistic Ballers and United Infrastructure — for their time, enthusiasm, and commitment to helping young people build brighter futures.

With such a strong start, we’re excited to see how the next Year 9 work experience unfolds — with upcoming programmes already planned in partnership with Ark, Aspirations, BDAT, and Northern Ireland schools. The success of the remote projects to date has also inspired the development of a hybrid offer, which we aim to deliver from Spring 2026.