Careers Programme
The British School aims not only to provide an outstanding teaching and learning environment, but also to support and guide students to make informed decisions about their future. Our careers programme, embedded across the curriculum, includes a wide range of events and opportunities to equip students with the knowledge and skills they need to develop their career path and inspire them to achieve their full potential.
The programme is primarily based on career guidance offered in the new PSHE programme, as well as through access to two comprehensive career portals with personalised profiles: Cascaid (cascaid.co.uk) and BridgeU (bridge-u.com).
Careers Events
The school arranges a variety of events and activities where students can meet representatives from businesses, education, voluntary organisations and former students for inspiration and guidance in a wide range of career areas. Regular events involving external participants include the careers club, employer talks and university visits as well as practice interviews for IB students.
Career Interviews
Students are invited to reach out to their role models and record video interviews (live or via Skype) about their career paths.
The questions in the interview should include the following points:
1) What subjects were you good at and bad at in Secondary School?
2) What options did you consider for university? What determined your final choices?
3) What personal characteristics helped you to choose and pursue your career?
4) How does your daily life look now? What are the best and the worst things in your current occupation?
5) What advice can you give to teenagers who consider choosing this profession?
6) any other questions are welcome
Our Student Tech Team will be available to help edit the recording, add subtitles or solve other technical issues.
We will share selected videos in school (for example at assemblies) and/or publish them online.
The project will let all our students see various paths to successful careers in real life examples and will be a fascinating, ambitious and enriching experience for the interviewers.
The initiative was inspired by an interview which our student, Tosia, made with an Olympic gold medallist, the top Polish swimmer, Paweł Korzeniowski, about his way to success. The video recording is available here.
Students or professionals interested in recording a Career Interview should contact the Careers and Work Experience Co-ordinator, Miss Diana Szyperska at careers@thebritishschool.pl or the Student Leader of the project: Tosia tosiabar@gmail.com
University guidance
Whilst traditionally the majority of TBS IB graduates have applied to UK Russell Group universities, we are aware that the higher education landscape is both vast and dynamic and that there are plenty of competitive alternatives available. At TBS we aim to provide a high standard of global university guidance, via formal presentation and information events for entire year groups and bespoke one-to-one meetings with individual students. Mr Clark (University Guidance) and Miss Szyperska (Careers and Work Experience) take the lead on advising students across the key stages, but there is strong input from Form Tutors, Heads of Year and academic subject specialists. Students are encouraged to be proactive and independent in their research, but also to make appointments with tutors and guidance counsellors to discuss options and to seek help with the nitty gritty of completing application forms.
We host a number of visits from representatives of leading universities throughout the school year, and promote attendance at HE exhibitions and university fairs taking place in Warsaw. Our recently launched interactive Bridge-U platform enables students to research, plan and develop their applications, and our Firefly resources link gives access to further useful information. The Resource Room, adjacent to the IB College Learning Centre, is being stocked with university prospectuses and various guides on, for example, additional testing for university applicants such as IELTS and SATs and this room also provides a useful space for quiet research and small group discussions with advisers.
Some key events in our University calendar are:
Year 12
· October: Workshop on university options and applications processes; Bridge-U registration · November: Visit to British Council HE Exhibition in Warsaw; visit of representatives and presentation from the London School of Economics (LSE), University College London (UCL) and Kings College London (KCL) · March: University Information Evening for students and parents; visit of Dutch Universities to TBS · May: Visit to Warsaw of Oxford University Representative · June: Workshop - course choices and personal statement drafts
Year 13
· September: Completion of personal statements and application forms for UK and USA early decision · October: Applications sent for Oxford, Cambridge, Medicine, Dentistry and Veterinary Science (by 15th October) · November: Remaining university applications for UK, USA and Netherlands · January: Final deadline for UCAS (UK) (15th January) and US applications
Getting involved
Our careers programme is gradually being enriched by the input from parents, former students and a variety of organisations. We highly value and appreciate the growing professional network within our community and we are always delighted to hear from others who would like to play a part in our programme.
Contacts
Careers advice, work experience co-ordination:
Miss Diana Szyperska
careers@thebritishschool.pl
University guidance and applications:
Mr Timothy Clark
timothy.clark@thebritishschool.pl