16 April 2021

Alumni helping break the isolation for rural schools

For some schools working with Future First, the potential of an alumni network can come as something of a surprise. Holbrook Academy near Ipswich joined us in September and the results were almost immediate. Denise Tinker, Holbrook’s Careers Lead, said: “We’re a rural school on a peninsula and, while many students stay local, a lot go far away and it was a question of how we were going to get hold of them to work with us still. Having Future First helped us achieve an amazing response. It went from six or seven former students at our last sign up to over 100 within little more than a night. And working with our Alumni Programme Manager is wonderful. She’s fantastic.... Read more

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13 December 2019

Mock interviews and alumni social events at Eggar’s School

Sarah McKenzie, Community Liaison Officer at Eggar’s School, talks to us about their Future First membership and working with their alumni network. We have about 950 students at Eggar’s, serving the east side of Alton and many of the surrounding villages. Our school day runs from 08:30 until 14:30 and we try to encourage our students to participate in extra-curricular opportunities after school with events such as the Lecture Club and our ten-point challenge ‘Eggar’s Experience’. It is designed to give students the chance to develop their abilities, identify talents and learn new skills alongside their academic work. Staff run 50+ after school clubs across a wide variety of topics from photography to beginners Spanish. Catherine, Eggar’s alumnus, acting as... Read more

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19 November 2019

The positive impact of former students at Madani Schools’ Federation

Imtiaz Patel, Deputy Head of Madani Schools’ Federation, talks to us about the positive impact of former students. We are a federation of two schools, Madani Boys School and Madani Girls School. The schools are relatively small, both with ‘good’ Ofsted ratings and high student performance, especially in the Girls School. We’re an Islamic faith school with students from many different ethnic backgrounds and approximately one third of our students on free school meals. Through joining Future First I’d like to see former students who work in a range of employment sectors and job fields to come in and speak to our young people through events like assemblies, award evenings and careers fairs. It would also be valuable to use... Read more

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13 September 2019

Opportunities and Life After School Options at Great Torrington

Sandra Peters, Personalised Learning Manager at Great Torrington School, explains how alumni can help current students figure out life after school. Great Torrington School is a predominantly rural school for students aged 11-16. Many pupils bus in from local villages, with a number coming from the small town of Torrington and the larger nearby town of Bideford too. We have lower than average FSM percentages and higher than national average SEN with statement or EHC plan students. We were lucky enough to receive the Future First support free of charge as part of our partnership with Next Steps SW and started working with Future First in 2018. Since starting our membership, we have invited alumni in for a number of... Read more

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11 September 2019

The Benefits of Alumni at Soham Village College

Nick Oakhill, Careers Manager at Soham Village College, explains the benefits of alumni in school. Using alumni has definitely helped with some of the issues that our school faces. Due to our rural location, a lot of our students cannot see the opportunities that are out there. This is not just limited to post 16 options but also thinking about future employment. In comparison to students in cities, such as Cambridge, Soham students have limited access and awareness about career pathways and the labour market. We are conscious as a school that there are issues of social mobility in the area and we want to make students realise that there is a bigger world out there. Alumni are one part... Read more

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04 September 2019

The Streetly Academy and Future First

Vicky O’Connor, careers lead at The Streetly Academy, talks about their partnership with Future First. I was brought in to The Streetly Academy to lead on the careers programme within the school; the head and SLT are very passionate about raising the aspirations of the pupils and wanted to improve their current careers programme by having someone who was dedicated to this full time. Before I came in to the school the provision was quite ad-hoc and minimal, whereas now the careers programme is implemented across all year groups and events and activities are scheduled frequently across the year. I began by creating a questionnaire to find out what the goals and aspirations were of our pupils, we then used... Read more

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18 July 2019

Oxbridge aspirations at Outwood Academy Danum

Outwood Academy Danum in Doncaster, South Yorkshire, hosted an event for Year 9 students, inviting three former students back to share their journeys from Outwood to Oxbridge. The event was an inspirational session for a small group of Year 9 students who the school believe have the potential to apply to Oxford or Cambridge one day with hard work and dedication. The three former students prepared PowerPoint presentations on their journey from Year 9 to Oxbridge which they shared during the session. Claire Du Puget, HeppSY Administration Officer at the school, talked us through the itinerary for the session: Three of our Oxbridge Alumni visited Outwood Academy Danum on Friday 24th May 2019. Each alumnus discussed their Post 16 and... Read more

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10 July 2019

The Importance of Former Students at Wickersley School and Sports College

Rachel Mullins, Careers & Post-16 Transitions Manager at Wickersley School and Sports College, tells us why former students are so important in helping to inspire current students. Wickersley is the biggest school in Rotherham with over 2000 students, including a Sixth Form, so students range from age 11-18. It’s a very successful school, in the top high achieving schools in South Yorkshire. The school is still a comprehensive with a mixed selection of students with varying abilities. We wanted to work with alumni because we’ve always had a culture where students really do value Wickersley so there have always been former students coming back to help in school and support our current students. Personally, I took a group on a... Read more

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26 June 2019

Engaging Alumni at Newcastle Sixth Form College

Mark Carton, Marketing Manager at Newcastle Sixth Form, tells us about working with Future First and engaging their alumni community. Newcastle Sixth Form College is a state of the art £23m facility dedicated to A levels in the heart of Newcastle City Centre. We offer a broad range of A Levels and Access to Level 3 qualifications, and work with students across the region from Teesside to North Northumberland with a focus on clear career progression into HE, Degree Apprenticeships and Employment. Each year we have opportunities for former students to come back and share their experiences with current students. We wanted to see if we could track the destinations of our students beyond university and HE into employment to... Read more

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22 May 2019

Improving Aspirations at Highfield Leadership Academy

John Hooper, Information, Advice and Guidance Officer at Highfield Leadership Academy, talks about the impact alumni can have on current students. The majority of students at Highfield Leadership Academy live very locally and there’s a strong history of parents and grandparents also having come through the doors here. There’s quite a high number of pupil premium students with some from deprived areas of Blackpool, though we also have students from more affluent backgrounds so it’s a real mix. Within Blackpool and specifically in our school there’s an issue with students having low aspirations for the future. With generational unemployment in some families, pupils don’t always have the ambition to get out of that cycle and those with the motivation to... Read more

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13 March 2019

Challenging career stereotypes with Waldegrave School students

Waldegrave School is a comprehensive in London for girls aged 11 – 18. From 2014 we opened a co-educational sixth form. We are a high performing school and in 2016 we were voted the top comprehensive school of the year by the Sunday Times Parent Power supplement. Waldegrave consistently performs well in the borough of Richmond and we are proud to specialise in Science and Maths. We decided to work with Future First as we wanted to use alumni to challenge both student and parental stereotypes of certain jobs. We want to emphasise that there are a number of different pathways and careers areas available to our young people. When we launched our new Sixth Form we wanted to have... Read more

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15 February 2019

Jo Richardson Community School talk relatable role models

Jo Richardson Community School started in 2002 with just one year group. We now have a purpose built building and have expanded to 10 form entry. Our sixth form is large with 177 young people, so it has been a key focus for us when working with our alumni. We are based in a deprived area with a high percentage of students on free school meals and a high percentage of students with parents who have never been to university. Our main priorities for working with former students are providing relatable role models and raising the aspirations of our students. The only graduates lots of them have ever encountered are the teachers at school and doctors. It is essential for... Read more

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20 November 2018

Prescot Primary School and their Future First experience

Our school is situated in Knowsley and serves a diverse range of children. Our motto is “putting the learner first” and we consider this in everything we do with our children. That’s why we took up the offer from Future First to work with them as part of their pilot in primary schools. We wanted to broaden our children’s horizons by taking a proactive approach to showing them the numerous pathways available in the future. Lots of our children have quite a narrow awareness of the world of work or things they might like to do after school. We knew that giving them the opportunity to meet former pupils of our school and volunteers who work locally would not only... Read more

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14 November 2018

Saints Peter and Paul Catholic Primary School shares their story

Our school is a large Catholic Primary School situated in Kirkby, Knowsley. We started working with Future First because we were still in touch with a lot of former students and wanted to make better use of these connections. Our school has a real family centred ethos. Lots of our parents are former pupils themselves and the community is very supportive. We thought we’d have a good chance of people being willing to come back into school to raise the aspirations of our children and broaden their horizons. The workshops the children took part in, raised their self-esteem massively and widened their ideas of what they could do in the future. The fact that the volunteers were from the local... Read more

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22 October 2018

Fighting misconceptions with Stoke High School Ormiston Academy

Stoke High School Ormiston Academy has been an academy since 2013 and we are a school that has challenges. The proportion of students that are eligible for pupil premium or who have special education needs is above the national average, and a high percentage have English as a second or foreign language. We also battle with a misconception that those who live in the IP2 postcode, in which the school falls, are unlikely to achieve. We decided to start working with our alumni to challenge this stigma and provide relatable role models for our young people to meet. The more I have met ex-students, the more I can see evidence that the assumption that they won’t be successful is simply... Read more

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12 October 2018

Frances Bardsley Academy and Future First

Frances Bardsley Academy (FBA) is an all-girls school in Havering with a rich history stretching back to our beginnings in 1906. We have a diverse cohort at FBA with a huge variety of over 40 languages spoken by our students. Employability is an issue in Havering so we try to prepare our students for the world of work as much as possible, focusing on confidence and careers to support their futures. With a gap in women going into STEM subjects, we also encourage our students in these areas from a young age. As a former student of FBA myself, I often talk to students about my school days and know that they appreciate hearing about my experiences. So when the... Read more

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09 August 2018

Why did Saint Benedict Catholic Academy, Derby choose Future First?

Nicola Campbell, Careers Coordinator and English Teacher: Saint Benedict Catholic Voluntary Academy is the only Catholic secondary school in the Derby area. We currently have around 1200 students and above average pupil premium numbers. Saint Benedict is a very diverse school where a great deal of languages are spoken. We decided to start working with Future First because we had contact details for a significant number of our alumni, but weren’t really utilising these connections. I also knew how much I enjoyed receiving communications from my former secondary school and wanted to give our school alumni the same opportunities to keep up to date with what is happening and get involved. Future First planned and delivered a World of Work... Read more

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14 March 2018

Oaklands Catholic School and Sixth Form College, Waterlooville, tells its story

Angela McQuiston, Head of Careers: “Oaklands Catholic School and Sixth Form College is an Academy school in Waterlooville, near Portsmouth. We serve a wide catchment area with students travelling from Portsmouth, Fareham and even Hayling Island. With this comes a wide range of socioeconomic backgrounds. We have been building our alumni network for the past three years and inviting former students back for occasions like ‘professional days’. Some alumni said freeing up a whole day was difficult for them, which is why we started hosting short talks during our 20 minute tutor/assembly time instead. We cast the net quite wide – simply suggesting a day of the week and letting former students choose the day that works best for them.... Read more

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12 February 2018

Tendring Technology College, Essex, tells its story:

“Tendring Technology College is an 11-18 academy in North-East Essex with 1844 students altogether and 300 in the Sixth Form. As a College we are proud of our students’ achievements and there is no better way to motivate and inspire them than by sharing the successes and experiences of alumni. Future First provided a great tool to enable us to do this. Future First’s Core package enabled us to establish a careers programme that works for all our students. It allowed us to develop and refine our provision to best fit their needs. Future First’s expertise helped our staff feel empowered to take ownership of our alumni programme and go forward with the DIY+ package. We promote the use of... Read more

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26 January 2018

Colleen tells her story

Future First is pioneering a three-year project that will see alumni support a group of students from Year 9 through to Year 11. Participating students have been specially chosen because their schools believe that they will benefit the most from this opportunity. Former students will work with the group in a series of bespoke Future First workshops to raise their aspirations and help them overcome barriers to achieving their potential. The Employability Skills Project, funded by Rothschild & Co through their UK Charitable Giving Programme, is taking place at schools in Bristol, Cambridgeshire, Cornwall and Newcastle. The project will see these students benefit from the support of former students with similar experiences to them, throughout a crucial stage in their... Read more

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11 January 2018

Kingsbury High School, Brent, tells its story

“Looking at our Year 13s, I can see that the Alumni Day has had an enormous impact on them. It gave them role models, targets to aspire to and an insight into professions that they might not otherwise have considered.” – Andrew Mitchell, Aim Higher Manager Kingsbury High School is an inner London state school with academy status, in the borough of Brent. We have over 2000 students, with just over 400 in the sixth form. We decided to start working with our alumni to enhance the induction programme for new Year 12s. We wanted the new sixth formers to meet former students who could inspire them, give them the drive to succeed and set their mind on emulating their... Read more

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23 November 2017

Ormiston Forge Academy, Cradley Heath, tells its story

At Ormiston Forge Academy, we make sure all of our students have a careers interview in Year 11 and that they get lots of support with thinking about their futures. We have a rising number of students who go on to Higher Education. At the moment, around 70 students apply to university and higher apprenticeships. This year, one student went on to do a degree level apprenticeship in Surveying, which is great as they’re quite competitive. We’re planning on inviting him to come back and talk to current students about his experience in the future. I first started thinking about how I could work with our former students when we had a launch meeting in school to discuss how our... Read more

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26 October 2017

St Dominic’s Sixth Form College, Harrow, tells its story

Angela Inglese, Assistant Principal: “St. Dominic’s Sixth Form College is a Catholic Sixth Form College in Harrow. We have approximately 1200 students aged between 16 and 18 and around 100 members of staff. The college is very diverse. We are very popular in the local area so the rest of our intake is from a range of ethnic backgrounds. We are very proud to have been named The Sunday Times’ Sixth Form College of the Year for 2017. We decided to start working with our alumni about five years ago. We signed up to Future First because their ethos really resonated with us, particularly around the power of role models and the impact former students can have broadening young people’s... Read more

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06 October 2017

Eastbury Community School, Barking, tells its story

Stuart Gander, Head of Careers Education: “Eastbury Community School is an all through school for three to 19-year-olds and there are roughly 1,850 students (primary school all the way up to sixth form). We are in one of the five most deprived areas of the country, and a large proportion of our students come from ethnic minority groups. We are a specialist maths and computing school and the number of pupil premium students is above the national average. We were recently voted the kindest school in the UK. We have been working with Future Fist for four years now, with the aim to inspire young people by inviting alumni back for all careers related events at the school. Events include... Read more

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26 September 2017

Bodmin College, Cornwall, tells its story

Jayne Smith, Raising Aspirations Coordinator: “Bodmin College is an 11-18 in Cornwall. The area we’re in is the lowest quintile of students who access higher education. It’s an indicator that we have work to do in terms of aspiration raising. I’m the Raising Aspirations Coordinator at the school. I took on the role because I felt working on this would help the students’ life chances by opening doors for them. Before this, I was the Head of Art at Bodmin College. I kept in touch with ex-students and would ask them back to share portfolios with the sixth formers. Undergrads came in to school to talk about university life and we would take our students to meet them at the... Read more

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07 September 2017

Highworth Grammar School, Kent, tells its story

Freyja Danielsen, Sixth Form and Careers Manager: We are a girls’ grammar school in Ashford, Kent and we have a mixed sixth form. At Highworth, as well as motivating students to work hard, we want students enjoy their experiences and want to study here. A few years ago and after graduating from university myself, we began to realise just how much universities use their alumni and could see how powerful former student stories could be. When we started to re-connect with people it became clear very quickly just how much our alumni were willing to do for us and more importantly, how much they truly wanted to do for us. We think it’s a brilliant concept and had heard that... Read more

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16 June 2017

Grey Court School, Ham, tells its story

Bernie Corrighan, Careers Adviser: “Grey Court School is a mixed comprehensive for 11 to 18-year-olds. We opened a sixth form in 2014. We’re based in Ham which is one of the most deprived areas in London, despite being in the borough of Richmond upon Thames. Students come from a mixed background: there’re different cultures and races. Our free school meal percentage is in line with the national average and our last Ofsted rating was Outstanding. I’m the careers adviser at Grey Court and at another school. We’ve run careers events for the last 10 years. We wanted to link in more with our alumni to get role models for our sixth formers. Any alumni work we had done before was... Read more

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24 November 2016

Skype Lessons from the Netherlands at Tiverton High School

Tiverton High School has shown how alumni can play a key role in supporting students from a 1000 miles away. Former students can play a key role in the delivery of the core curriculum. Returning to their old classrooms, alumni enrich the curriculum by co-delivering lessons related to their careers, helping build students’ understanding of the real-world application of their learning whilst boosting their motivation to work harder at the same time. Tiverton High School is located in North Devon. Since many of their former students have moved away from the area, the school set out to find a way to involve alumni in the curriculum remotely. They decided to organise a series of talks, in which alumni use Skype to... Read more

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24 November 2016

‘Send a Selfie’ at The Bridge Academy

The Bridge Academy in Hackney has shown how a simple campaign involving recent leavers can be used to inspire current students. The school launched its ‘send a selfie’ campaign in October. They asked former students to take a selfie in front of their university building, to inspire current students considering the university route. The pictures will be displayed at the upcoming sixth form open evening, to show parents and students that students from The Bridge Academy end up at top universities. The featured picture is of Tyronne Ellis, in his first year of Business Studies at Birkbeck, University of London. This is just one example of the ways in which The Bridge Academy has harnessed the talents of its alumni... Read more

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16 November 2016

Mentoring for High Achievers at Warden Park Academy

Warden Park Academy, in Sussex, has worked with Future First for three years. They have harnessed the support of their former students in a whole host of ways, most recently as career speakers, mentors, and donors. In October, the school launched their Highly Able Mentoring Scheme. The programme involves intensive interaction between a former student who specialises in a specific subject area and high attaining Year 10 students. They have kicked off the programme with Luke Mitchell who is currently at university. The first session took place at the end of October, in which Luke co-taught a lesson on romantic poetry. He then ran an afternoon session focused on Literacy Criticism for 30 high attaining students. Due to great feedback from... Read more

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30 September 2016

An Introduction to Sixth Form at Thomas Hardye School, Dorchester

Thomas Hardye School, a secondary academy in Dorset, has been working with Future First since May 2016 to build an alumni community. They already have over 200 students on their network, including lawyers, managers, electricians and university students. In September 2016, Future First supported the school to run a day of workshops involving alumni for students on their first day of sixth form. The majority of students who took part are studying A Levels and hope to progress into further education, but many of them have limited exposure to adults in jobs they would like to do. The workshops aimed to broaden students’ horizons and motivate them to work hard by introducing them to former students who had gone through... Read more

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16 August 2016

Alumni drop-in sessions at Ernest Bevin College

Ernest Bevin College is an 11-18 comprehensive in Tooting, London. The school have been building an alumni community with Future First since 2013. Enrichment afternoons are timetabled for sixth form students every Wednesday so that students can take part in a valuable activity within their normal timetable. Staff at Ernest Bevin have historically struggled to resource the afternoons and staff haven’t had the time to organise activities that would keep the boys in school. Rose Banks, sixth form study manager, worked with Future First to use the school’s growing alumni network to plan inspiring sessions, inviting former students to a timetable of talks each Wednesday. Each week, a former student returns to school and speaks about their pathway, from school to... Read more

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16 August 2016

Raising Aspirations at Newall Green High School

Newall Green High School is a mixed 11-18 comprehensive in Manchester. The school has been working with Future First for three years to grow a community of former students and embed a community culture across the school. According to the Social Mobility Index, the area has one of the worst records for social mobility in England. The school report that there are generations of unemployment in the area and that they want to give students and their families support to find out what career options are out there. The staff at Newall Green do fantastic work to help broaden students horizons. A ‘success wall’ lines the main entrance where former students appear on posters designed to inspire students as they walk... Read more

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16 August 2016

Building Motivation at Wellfield High School

Wellfield High Sdchool is a secondary school in Leyland for 11-16 year olds and has been building an alumni network with the support of Future First since September 2014. owing a period in special measures, exam results have improved remarkably, but raising aspirations remains a key challenge for the school. The school leadership selected 30 Year 10 students who were lacking in confidence to take part in Future First’s Building Motivation programme. Through a structured programme of three workshops, students were exposed to a range of inspirational alumni. Co-designed with teachers in the school, the programme also responded to local needs. For example, the school wanted to hear from alumni from BAE Systems- the largest local employer- as well as... Read more

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02 August 2016

E-mentoring at St James School, Devon

St James is a growing 11-16 comprehensive in Devon, with approximately 695 students. After a highly successful year in 2014, they have continued to work with Future First to grow and gain value from their alumni network, which now numbers over 350 former students. In 2015, St James embarked on an e-mentoring scheme targeting students allocated pupil premium to motivate and inspire them about life at school and beyond, as well as providing study advice and revision tips. In combination with other measures, e-mentoring has proved instrumental in giving Year 10 Kaydie the extra confidence and motivation to boost her grades, She has been more focused leading into exams. After talking through her options with her mentor, Alli, Kaydie is now... Read more

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16 June 2016

Alumni in the Curriculum at Felpham Community College

Since 2013, Felpham has been working with Future First to expand its alumni network and invite former students in to share their knowledge and experience. Felpham aimed to boost the engagement of Year 9 students in their science lessons by involving scientific learning in their careers. This focus on science through alumni engagement also chimes with growing calls from businesses and government to upskill students in STEM subjects. The first week saw a visit from Victoria, an interior trim planner at Rolls Royce. During the session, students looked at the materials science which Victoria uses in her job on a daily basis. The students had the opportunity to explore areas such as product testing by conducting ‘elongation tests’ on sample... Read more

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06 May 2016

Learning to game at Oathall Community College, Haywards Heath

Oathall Community College, Haywards Heath, has been working with Future First since 2013 to engage former students and invite them back to support current students. Former student, David Amor, went back to school to speak to an A Level Computing class who were completing their first big piece of programming coursework. The class teacher hoped that by learning from an expert the students would gain a deeper understanding of the scheme of work and also of the wide variety of jobs that are available to them. David delivered an engaging presentation about his career as a computer games developer and talked about factors that make a good computer game. Much to the students delight, he spoke about candy crush and the possible... Read more

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06 April 2016

Radio 1 DJ heads back to school

In February, 2016, Future First took part in Radio 1’s 1 Million Hours campain, which aims to encourage young people to give up time to volunteer in their communities. The campaign kicked off with Future First taking Radio 1 presenter, Scott Mills, back to his old school, Crestwood College in Eastleigh, to speak to Year 8 students about the possibilities of a career in media. The event was a fantastic success. Scott spoke about his experience at school, and his persistence to find work experience on local radio channels. He was made honorary Deputy Head Boy after chatting to current students about his career path which took him from Hampshire local radio to acting, an appearance on BBC TV’s Strictly Come Dancing and presenting Radio 1’s... Read more

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03 March 2016

International Women’s Day at Ark Helenswood Academy

ARK Helenswood Academy is one of Future First’s ‘In House’ schools, which sees a Future First staff member working on site to rapidly embed a culture of alumni engagement across the fabric of the school. The school have made great progress and have have invited alumni back to support in the curriculum, to speak in assemblies and take part in inspirational workshops. For International Women’s Day, Helenswood’s Head Girl organised an inspiring alumni event for her year group as they prepared for their GCSEs and leaving Helenswood. Future First helped her make the event a reality by briefing teachers on facilitation techniques, reaching out to former students to come and share their stories and creating resources. The event resulted in fantastic feedback from... Read more

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