Speed Mentoring Event at Bexleyheath Academy

About the Business Leaders

These business leaders have been chosen because their companies are growing quickly.

About the teacher and students

The event was created by Sarah Stocking for 500 students at Bexleyheath Academy aged Age 12 - 15.

Event description

Please inspire our students by helping year 10s solve workplace scenarios and speed networking with year 8s, giving valuable insight into t

I would like to invite Business leaders participate in a series of short, focused conversations about specific career questions and topics. I appreciate how one short conversation can greatly inspire our students to work that bit harder, change a behaviour and raise their aspirations! Business leaders meet a limited number of students in both year 8 + 10. This is the 3rd year we have run this style event and the feedback we have received from students and business leaders has been extremely positive.

Year 8 Students: 5-minute time slots each. Students will have prepared questions to ask and we will also supply you with pre-prepared question cards which the students can randomly select to gain valuable insight into the world of work

Year 10 students: Speed Networking and Case studies. As the year 10s have previously had the opportunity to network with employers and ask questions, we thought we would like to tailor the event to help students gain a deeper understanding of the behaviour and expectations for various workplace settings. We would like to supply some various scenarios for students to discuss with you and to find out about how it would be dealt with in your work place. For example:

- Your missed your bus and you are going to be late to work – what should you do?

- A colleague of yours is spending most of their day ‘surfing the internet’ rather than working – what should you do?
- Your manager is off sick, but another manager from another department gives you work to do which means you can’t get your daily work done – what do you think you should do?

Speed mentoring offers students the opportunity to ask meaningful questions to a range of different business leaders, to gain an insight into their working life and receive advice on the skills that are needed to be successful in today’s economy.

The staff team and myself here at Bexleyheath Academy would value your involvement. The event will be set up so that you don’t need to prepare anything, however if you feel young people are not always well prepared to join the workplace, please let me know your areas of concern and I will try to include these within the question cards, scenarios and our wider careers programme.

The timings of the day are as follows:
08:30 exhibitors arrive, refreshments
09:00 – 10:00 Session 1 (approx 160 students)
10:00 – 11:00 Session 2 (approx 160 students)
11.10 -11.20 break
11.20 – 12:20 Session 3 (approx 160 students)
12:20 – 13:20 Session 4 (approx 160 students)

Thank you for taking the time to consider this request.

Kind regards,
Sarah Stocking
Head of Careers Education, Information, Advice and Guidance
sstocking@bexleyheathacademy.org