Sofia's careers education engagement 2022
The Sofia team engaged with more than 6700 students through its work with North East primary and secondary schools, colleges and universities during 2022.
Engaging with a wide cross section of students throughout the year
Sofia's education team, along with project team members, took part in 65 education engagement events during 2022, reaching more than 6700 students with messages about offshore wind and its careers.
The events ranged from school-organised assemblies and careers fairs, to direct engagement with hands-on classroom exercises, mock interviews and full-day projects. They form a core part of Sofia's education and skills strategy to increase the levels of interest in offshore wind energy as a career choice.
The split of events was 18 at primary schools, 19 at secondary schools, 12 at colleges and three at special needs educational institutions, plus five at universities and eight at other wider cross-school events. As well as engaging with students Sofia has developed close relationships with school staff and engaged with more than 42 teachers and careers leads during the year.
Sofia's education approach was designed to align to the Gatsby Benchmarks for good careers guidance education and in particular aims to focus on helping schools to: learn from career and labour market information; link curriculum learning to careers; ensure their students have encounters with employers and employees and by offering experiences of workplaces.
By employing education specialists including former teachers, and by using in-project experts with different educational backgrounds as volunteers, the team was able to highlight the range of careers available in the sector and received a vast amount of positive feedback from students, teachers and school management.
It was recognised early that gaining support from across the project team was particularly key to ensuring a wide number of voices are heard by the young people seeking careers and wondering what to do with their futures.
Sofia has also worked closely with its Tier 1 suppliers to ensure they are also aware and engaged with education careers opportunities in the North East, as our key area of focus.
February 2023
