careers

Crown Prosecution Service Webinar

Students and Pupils with an interest in pursuing legal careers, volunteered to take part in a webinar with the Crown Prosecution Service. Alongside celebrating International Women’s’ Day, with talks from some inspiring female leaders, the session allowed pupils to understand more about a career within the legal profession directly from the experts. 

bbs-careers-1

Sixth Form University Taster Lectures

Our Sixth Form students have been signing up to attend taster lectures at local universities, with popular topics including Motion Tracking using AI, Making a Murderer and a French Language Booster. 

These taster sessions are a great way for students to experience university level teaching and help them to decide what course to study. It is also an excellent opportunity to explore a university campus and get a feel for where they may wish to study.   

Our Year 12 Sports Scientists impressed lecturers at the University of Birmingham with their engagement in a series of mini taster lectures, covering everything from the nitty-gritty of Politics and Policy, to the fascinating realms of Physiology, Psychology, Neuroscience and Physiotherapy.

Sixth Form students should check their emails regularly for advertisements about university and employer taster events.  

PHOTO-2024-02-23-09-29-38-1

Youth Parliament Success

8 of our aspiring lawyers in Year 12 took part in the regional Youth Parliament Debate for the Midlands. 

They faced a number of tricky topics, spanning from the ethical questions arising from Artificial Intelligence to the cost of living crisis. 

Students prepared well for their debates and spoke with confidence to put forward their arguments. It was certainly a scary prospect for them, and they had strong competition from the opposing teams, but the students grasped the spirit of the debates quickly. Of the two debates the team from Barr Beacon School led, both motions were passed!  It spoke to the calibre of each student and their natural tenacity, articulation and awareness of the wider issues in the world. 

A teacher from Loughborough Grammar School, who was in attendance during the event, took the time to write to us: “I was so impressed with the team fielded by your school, even more so as I understand from your staff that it was their first time doing it, although this was not at all apparent from the impressive way they conducted themselves. They spoke so eloquently and thoughtfully, and worked so well together as a team, being superb ambassadors for your school.”

6

Enterprise Masterclass

A group of our Year 9 pupils took part in an Enterprise Masterclass at the University of Birmingham. Following a tour of the campus, pupils created their own business ideas around a UN Sustainable Development Goal. They discovered new ways to generate creative ideas as a team and all pupils successfully completed an elevator pitch, which developed their presentation skills. Pupils were able to have a taste of studying Business at university and even took part in work that is usually given to undergraduate level students. 

image002

PwC Visit

PwC visited the school to talk to our Year 12 students who are interested in pursuing apprenticeships. PwC offer a range of School Leaver Apprenticeships and Flying Start Degree Apprenticeships programmes. Representatives from the company spoke about their own experience of working for PwC and gave tips to succeed with their competitive application process. 

IMG_9970

WPR Agency PR Workshop

Year 12 Business and Media students took part in a PR workshop, run by WPR Agency. 

After learning about what working in PR involves, and its differences to advertising, students were set a task. They put together an pitch for a new restaurant in the Bullring, encompassing media coverage, social content, influencer engagement and events. Our visiting speaker was very impressed with the innovative ideas from each group and praised students for their creativity and excellent team work when formulating ideas. 

Students said they enjoyed the chance to ‘have a go’ at a real career and valued having the chance to work in a team. They were interested to share their ideas and hear what the other groups had created, and one student even said “I didn’t realise before, but I am actually more creative than I thought.”

Home-Page-Image-About-9-1

National Apprenticeship Week

National Apprenticeship Week is taking place from Monday 5th to Sunday 11th February. There are lots of events taking place online for pupils and parents/carers to explore. Please take a look at the booklet below for more information.


3-1

Mock Interviews

Year 11 pupils were given mock interviews today by our Year 13 Students. The Sixth Formers received training for this last week and were able to share their recent experiences of real interviews and offer some unique advice.

The Year 11 pupils said:

“I actually enjoyed that. I was nervous at first but the Sixth Former was really nice”. 

“I have my actual interview at college soon, so I am glad I did it”.

“I’m so proud of myself, I did really well.”

“I got 49/50 and I want to do it again to get full marks. I know I can do it!”

The Sixth Form students said: 

“I was amazed by the pupils I met. They had achieved so much and were really confident.” 

“I have really enjoyed supporting Year 11 with their Interviews. I met some lovely people.”

“The pupils were fantastic. Some needed to remember to include examples of where they had developed their skills, but overall I was very impressed.”

“I felt like I had a lot in common with some of the pupils I met and I hope they found it useful to hear I went through the same struggles as them and still managed to get good GCSEs”.

IMG_688464

University of Birmingham

Year 7 pupils enjoyed a festive visit to University of Birmingham where they attended two Christmas Lectures. A lecture from the biology department focused on saving Christmas plants from environmental damage, and a workshop from the Mechanical Engineering team introduced pupils to how AI is helping the manufacturing industry build Christmas presents. The highlight of this was when the Robotic Reindeer entered the room. Both lectures offered the chance for our pupils to get involved with the experiments and gain a taste of what university learning is like. 

image00169

In2Med School

Year 12 students aspiring to become doctors and dentists have begun their mentoring programme with In2Med School. The long term support will run throughout Year 12 and 13 and aims to support students in making successful applications to highly competitive courses in the healthcare field. Our student mentor is currently training to become a doctor at the University of Birmingham and is volunteering to support students every step of the way with their journey to medical school. Beginning with learning about the medical issues in their community and the challenges facing the NHS, students will be supported in developing their voluntary experiences and building up essential skills needed to be effective healthcare practitioners, right through to getting expert guidance with their applications, UCAT testing and interviews.   

Contact Info

Barr Beacon School
Old Hall Lane
Aldridge, Walsall
West Midlands
WS9 0RF

T: 0121 366 6600
postbox@barrbeaconschool.co.uk

Monday - Thursday: 8:00 am - 4:00 pm
Friday: 8:00 am - 3:30 pm

Copyright 2024 © All Rights Reserved

CEOP-1