Skills London

Skills London is the UK’s largest careers event for 14-24 year olds, held at the Excel in East London. Welcoming 24,000 people over two days, the event brings together young people, schools, parents/carers, employers and post 16 and post 18 education providers.

This year for the first time, all 4 London Career Hubs have come together to bring a stand to the event. The focus of the stand was to promote our recently launched free Labour Market Information (LMI) online platform, Start in London, developed in partnership with U-Explore.

Start in London launched on 4th October:

‘Start in London’ is an accessible, engaging platform, aiming to provide vital sector information to students, parents, teachers and employers. The platform was created as a response to significant changes in the economic landscape in recent years and responds to a surge in demand from careers educators and parents for up-to-date, relevant information as students consider their options.

Start in London is a free-to-use platform designed to ‘inspire, excite and inform students about careers and study’ and should become viewed as a key part of a wider, holistic careers programme. Students using the platform will be able to input their current career aspirations and receive personalised information at a local and industry level. By accessing their own Start Profile, students will be empowered to explore resources tailored to their own interests; helping to inform their study intentions and longer-term career decisions.’

Over the two day event, the team were able to provide live demonstrations of the platform, supporting young people to source vital information about LMI and potential careers as varied as Undertakers and Mortuary Assistants to airline pilots and civil engineers.

Alongside this, the Hubs also collaborated with the Greater London Authority to promote careers and qualification routes in London’s 5 key growth sectors: Health and Social Care, Hospitality, Green Skills, Creative and Digital. We did this by creating a treasure hunt around the event, linking the Mayors Skills Academies, providing prompt questions to support young people to find out more about careers and qualifications in these sectors. After visiting all 5 of the Skills Academy stands, young people were able to unscramble a code word which they brought back to the Careers Hub stand to claim their prize!

One of the final highlights of the event was speaking with Jules Pipe, Deputy Mayor for London of Planning, Regeneration and Skills, sharing the work of the 4 London Career Hubs and the support that the Start in London platform offers teachers, young people and parents/carers.