Careers Champions celebrated by Gatsby and The Careers & Enterprise Company

The Gatsby Foundation and The Careers & Enterprise Company (CEC) marked National Careers Week 2021 (1-5 March) by honouring the Careers Champions who have made an incredible difference to career guidance in a year so disrupted by COVID-19.

The CEC’s Careers Champions campaign, supported by Gatsby, received over 400 submissions in just two weeks in January 2021. Last week some of the highlights were recognised – including schools, colleges, Careers Leaders and employee volunteers, as well as the young people who have so successfully grasped career guidance opportunities to learn more about the world of work.

Recognitions were celebrated across five themes, including tackling disadvantage; examples of impactful innovation; and those who have excelled in allowing young people to explore technical education pathways. Professor Sir John Holman (author of Good Career Guidance which introduced the Gatsby Benchmarks) contributed as sponsor to the theme of Leading the Way, in recognition of the crucial value of strong leadership for embedding a commitment to careers in schools, colleges and employers alike.

During the week, the CEC also called on the careers community to make their own recognitions.  The response was striking: in addition to the 21 examples highlighted by the CEC, there were a further 1,000 uses of the #CECCareersChampions hashtag on social media, from people and organisations paying tribute to their own Careers Champion. The campaign to date has reached over 160,000 people on social media.

As National Careers Week 2021 ends, Gatsby would like to congratulate all of the Careers Leaders, careers advisers, school and college staff, employee volunteers, enterprise coordinators and organisations who have dedicated themselves to careers in this particularly disrupted year, to ensure young people can continue to be inspired by the world of work and achieve their potential.  Profiles of the Careers Champions highlighted by the CEC can be read on the Careers Champions website.