Year 12 WEX week - 26th to 30th January 2026

Year 10 WEX week - 16th to 20th March 2026

Work Experience is an important part of our careers programme and is an excellent opportunity for students to gain an understanding of the skills and qualities required by employers. All Year 10 & 12 students will be expected to take part in our Work Experience Programme.

In order for students to gain the valuable job hunting skills, which are so important in today’s job market, we ask that all students take responsibility for planning and finding their own placements. We strongly advise students make contact with prospective employers as soon as possible, as other schools will be participating in work experience during this period.

You will hopefully be able to find something that links into your future ideas, if you are not sure what is the best option, come and see a member of the Careers Team in WS13 at form or lunch on Monday, Tuesday or Thursday.

Parent & Carer Information

How can I help my child find a placement?

• Discuss the type of placement that would be of interest.

• Often friends and family members have good contacts and are worth approaching. 

• Encourage them to search online for local companies in the sector they would like to work in.

• Employers should be approached by the student and not the parent. Employers like to see students using their imitative and motivation and are more likely to respond in a positive way, you can support them by practising the script they can use to make employer phone calls. 

• If your child is struggling to secure a placement remind them to contact Miss Hardman for further support, she can be contacted by wex@sprowstonhighsch.org or in person on a Tuesday and Thursday lunchtime in WS13

Things to consider when choosing a placement.

• Consider transport implications. How will your child get to their placement? Will they travel on public transport? The placement should be somewhere the child can realistically travel to. 

• Think about what is important to then in a job? For example, working with people / animals / computers. Which environment would they like, outdoors, shop, office, lab

• Be open to a placement that matches the skills needed in their future career ideas but maybe not the specific sector.

What happens when my child is offered a placement?

• Once your child is offered a placement, they will need to complete the WEX placement form. This has sections that will need to be completed by the employer and a parent/carer before being returned. The form can be completed online or using the paper copy.

• Additional paper copies of the form if your childs is lost can be collected from WS13

• Completed forms should be returned as soon as possible to Miss Hardman in WS13 or emailed to WEX@sprowstonhighsch.org, this allows the legal pre placement health & safety, risk assessment, safeguarding and insurance checks to take place. If a WEX form is handed in after the deadline we cannot guarantee that the placement will be able to go ahead.

• Around 2 weeks before the placement begins students will be required to contact their placement to check that everything is ok and confirm they will be attending. 

Prohibitions for children under the age of 16 

There are certain activities, which a Work Experience student is prohibited from undertaking.

 Use of machinery or equipment which may be dangerous for new or young workers to operate, handling hazardous chemicals, firing equipment/arms, driving of any sort, riding in an open trailer or working above 2 metres in height.

 Students should only observe working practices from a safe distance where prohibited activities are within the placement location. 

We also recommend that students should not work on unstable flooring/platforms and when being transported in a vehicle, whether with a group or lone driver, seatbelts must be worn by the student and employers should ensure the car is road worthy with valid vehicle documents and insurers are aware of students on work experience. 

In addition, any students working with animals should be supervised at all times and those students riding animals should be assessed by the provider for experience and competence prior to agreeing any such activity and any inexperienced student should not be allowed to participate.