Provider Access (Baker Clause)
Okehampton College uses the Gatsby Benchmarks as a guide to plan our careers and enrichment programmes. As part of our commitment to informing our students of the full range of learning and training pathways on offer to them, we are happy to consider requests from training, apprenticeship, and vocational education providers to speak to students.

Gatsby Standards
The eight Gatsby Benchmarks of Good Career Guidance are:
1. A stable careers programme
2. Learning from career and labour market information
3. Addressing the needs of each pupil
4. Linking curriculum learning to careers
5. Encounters with employers and employees
6. Experiences of workplaces
7. Encounters with further and higher education
8. Personal guidance
 
Link to Gatsby Website: Education | Gatsby​

This policy statement sets out the school’s arrangements for managing the access of providers to pupils at Okehampton College for the purpose of giving them information about the provider’s education or training. This complies with the school’s legal obligations under Section 42B of the Education Act 1997.

Baker Clause
What is the Baker Clause? Introduced as an amendment to the Technical and Further Education Act 2017, the Baker Clause stipulates that schools must allow colleges and training providers access to every student in Years 8 to 13 to inform them about approved technical education qualifications and apprenticeships. Careers guidance and access for education and training providers The Department for Education (DfE) has updated the Statutory guidance for schools and sets out expectations for compliance, which include: 
  • Schools must act impartially and not show any bias towards any route, be that academic or technical. 
  • Schools should promote the full range of technical options. 
  • Schools must open their doors to other education and training providers, providing a range of opportunities for providers to talk to all year 8 - 13 pupils about their offer. 
  • Pupils should be aware of the benefits of apprenticeships, T Levels and other approved technical education qualifications. 
  • Schools should make every effort to improve their performance against the 8 Gatsby Benchmarks. 
  • Governing bodies and senior leaders should review their arrangements for provider access and prepare and publish a policy statement on the school website.
A provider wishing to request access should contact either B. Pamer -  Email: [email protected] or
A. Skelton - Email: [email protected]

Opportunities for providers to speak with students may include school assemblies, employer and provider engagement events or opportunities to speak with students and parents on a one-to-one basis supporting GCSE, post 16 or post 18 option choices. Okehampton College careers and personal development programme is monitored for quality and impact by the College Senior Leadership and Governance Teams.  Monitoring of access to, and opportunities to engage with, technical, vocational and training providers will form part of this process. Several events, integrated into the school careers programme, will offer providers an opportunity to come into school to speak to pupils and/or their parents/carers.

All requests will be considered based on; staffing availability to support the activity, clashes with other planned activity, trips or visits to the College, interruption to preparation for examinations and rooming and space availability to host the activity. This will all be discussed and agreed in advance of the visit with the Careers Leader or a member of their team. Providers are welcome to leave a copy of their prospectus or other relevant course literature at the main reception.

Okehampton College would like to welcome further providers to attend the school and speak to students regarding employment, apprenticeships, training providers and employers. Please contact Mr H. Biddle  or alternatively Mrs
B. Hachipuka  (Joint Careers Leads) if you would like to be a part of the careers programme.

Stakeholder views on careers at Okehampton College
​Okehampton College is keen to work with students, parents and local employers to enhance our careers provision.  Please use the links below to provide us with feedback on our careers programme and ways in which you can support us further with the provision for our students. 
  • Pupil feedback: We are interested to hear the views of pupils at Okehampton College. We regularly review our provision of the careers program and specific events via student voice activities. For any specific or individual items of feedback, pupils can also use the following link to share their views.  Click here.
 
  • Parental feedback:  We are interested to hear the views of parents too. To support the development of our careers strategy, please provide any specific or individual items of feedback using the following link to share your views.  Click here.

 
  • ​Employer contact details: If you are interested in working with us as college, either through careers-fair events/trips, offering apprenticeships or being a visiting speaker, please email [email protected] ​ or [email protected] (joint careers leads) and we will get in touch with you.
The college is also committed to reviewing our provision and will carry out in-house quality assurance exercises linked to aspects of the careers programme throughout the year.  This information will be shared as part of an annual review with the local stakeholder board.