Are our children too young to make career choices

Milla · Post by **Milla** » Fri Dec 11, 2009 3:59 pm

just coffee and photocopying wasn't it?

Post by **hermanmunster** » Fri Dec 11, 2009 4:46 pm

zee wrote:
hermanmunster wrote:Work experience tends to only show the interesting bits
You must know people who were very skilled or lucky at getting placements. Of those I know, the main problem with work experience was that so much of it was boring because even if it was a field they were vaguely interested in, there was so little they were actually able to do.

... in my case (30+ years ago) I was preparing blood films (wouldn't be allowed now for a 16 yr old) and DS was watching as new Barons and baronesses were "created".

marigold · Post by **marigold** » Fri Dec 11, 2009 4:53 pm

My daughter did one week in a private medical clinic and one week at a local NHS hospital for her work experience.

The first week she was up to her ears watching a cataract operation within an hour, in the NHS hospital she spent a week in the Nurses rest room reading Grazia and eating the chocs left over from Christmas.

A lot of her friends who did theirs in shops/hairdressers have got Saturday jobs following their work experience.
While they may not have been the most prestigious of placements, in the long term they certainly turned out to be the most useful.

Looking for help · Post by **Looking for help** » Fri Dec 11, 2009 5:00 pm

marigold wrote:My daughter did one week in a private medical clinic and one week at a local NHS hospital for her work experience.

The first week she was up to her ears watching a cataract operation within an hour, in the NHS hospital she spent a week in the Nurses rest room reading Grazia and eating the chocs left over from Christmas.

A lot of her friends who did theirs in shops/hairdressers have got Saturday jobs following their work experience.
While they may not have been the most prestigious of placements, in the long term they certainly turned out to be the most useful.

It depends...my daughter did her work experience in a hairdressers. It was quite far away from us, so wouldn't really work for a Saturday job. During the week there apart from all the jobs that you'd expect she also had to clean up sick (small child didn't feel well, nice mummy said oh be quiet I'm having my hair done, and yuk, she got to clean it up

) She worked hard all week, doing all the jobs nobody else wanted to do -basically unpaid help, at the end she was offered a Saturday job, she explained that she had GCSEs coming up and it was quite far from home, so wouldn't be suitable and got an earful from the boss about what an opportunity she was passing up. When he then went to fill in the form he was less than complementary

adding comments like she wasn't able to join in and be a member of the team, her appearance wasn't good enough etc, etc. All in all there is a certain ladies hairdressers we will not be visiting again

Post by **hermanmunster** » Fri Dec 11, 2009 5:07 pm

blimey LFH - that is a real pain!!! the people who take kids on work experience don't always realise how little experience of the world the kids have - it sounds like your daughter worked really hard and didn't deserve to have a bad report. Also sensible it turning down the saturday job for those reasons..... I remember leaving a saturday job to concentrate on exams in 6th form and the manager said ... "but all the time I've spent training you" ??? huh ???!!! what training ???.... I mean how long does it take to press a button on a till and these were the days before credit / debit cards.....

Looking for help · Post by **Looking for help** » Fri Dec 11, 2009 5:11 pm

Yes it was a bit of an eye opener for her....and it was good in that this little missey doesn't really see the point in working hard at school. At least she knows now what it'll be like if she doesn't get her finger out and apply herself a little

That said, she is the kind of person who gets on and does what's she's told without really complaining, bless her, and managed to get through the week without throwing in the towel, so that's a positive too

Post by **hermanmunster** » Fri Dec 11, 2009 5:15 pm

Does sound like she did very well in the circumstances.....

.. agreed about the encouragement to work hard at school, used to say to the kids that the most important thing you learn on work experience is what jobs you DON'T want to do!!!