Select committee: Education Committee
Conclusion 17
Fourth Report - Careers Education, Information, Advice and Guidance
Published 29 Jun 2023
Paragraph 65
Addressed to Department for Education
Education Committee Careers Education, Information, Advice and Guidance (CEIAG) All items in this report Report on parliament.uk ↗ Inquiry on parliament.uk ↗
Conclusion (the committee's words)
Starting careers education early is essential to broadening children’s horizons and showing them the full range of opportunities in the world of work. The Department has so far been taking an approach of relatively small-scale pilot programmes to test approaches, which appear to have been making a positive start, but support should be scaled up as soon as possible to ensure that the whole country can benefit.
From: Education Committee, Fourth Report - Careers Education, Information, Advice and Guidance (HC 54), paragraph 65, 29 June 2023
Government response
The government responded to the whole report on 21 September 2023 (deadline 29 August 2023).
Summary written by Accountability Index from the government's response. It is not the government's own words.The government says it welcomes the report and "accept[s] fully or in part the majority of the Committee's recommendations", and says that where it does not fully accept one, it has an alternative existing or planned approach.
- On a new strategy, it agrees there is "a strong case" and intends to publish a Strategic Action Plan for Careers in 2024, setting clear measurable outcomes and dates.
- It does not accept additional numerical Gatsby Benchmark targets, saying they risk "encouraging a tick-box approach".
- It is "not persuaded" that it should suggest a proportion of time for Careers Leaders, and "does not agree" with ringfencing funding for careers advisers, saying schools and colleges are best placed to decide their own arrangements.
- It agrees to update the careers statutory guidance in spring 2024 to set an expectation that schools and colleges self-report against the Gatsby Benchmarks annually, while avoiding mandating Compass.