why do we need work experience?

I am here to settle the popular debate on whether work experience is important or not.

There are many debates on whether work experience is actually necessary or if it’s just a ‘waste of time’, whereby students get to spend time off from school. Work experience, generally a week, where students get to experience what work-life is like post-secondary. In this article I will be explaining not only my views, but others opinions on work experience, if it is important or just a waste.

Most teenagers have no idea what they want to do when they leave school, which is completely normal. You don't need to have your life planned out at the age of 16. However, work experience gives the students a perspective on what path they do or don’t want to go on after leaving education. Further to  that, due to many teenagers being inexperienced in the workplace they generally don't know what to expect when the time comes for them to get an actual job. However, students are more likely to know more about working when they’ve already had a metaphorical ‘free trial' for it. 

For my work experience, I have been working with Push. Push, as we know, is a not-for-profit organisation that supports school-leavers, particularly those from disadvantaged backgrounds, to make well informed decisions about their futures and to have the skills and resources to make their choice a reality. When doing my work experience at Push, I did multiple jobs such as going back-and-forth with a client via email, promoting the company on their social media platforms, going to a careers event and joining a meeting with the CEO of the company. I have a general plan of what I want to do when I leave school, and that consists of working in New York City, writing and beauty or also referred to as a beauty journalist- that lives in New York, obviously. Push really helped me with pointing me in the right direction for my future. They knew my dreams and told me what I had to do to get there.  

On my third day of work experience I went to Generation Broxbourne, a careers event helping teenagers to inspire ideas of what they would like to do post-school. There were many companies there including Tesco, University of Hertfordshire, Sky, The NHS, Barclay’s and many more. Personally, I got a great idea of what I wanted to do when the time comes for me to leave secondary. 

Going back to my point of is work experience necessary, personally I believe it is. Work experience has many benefits as I've already mentioned. However, while at Generation Broxbourne, I talked to Gareth Dace, Careers Hub Strategic Lead at Hertfordshire Local Enterprise Partnership. He stated that “work experience is very important for everyone to gain because you’ll get great insights into different companies” and that “working with lots of different people through different ages and generations is really important.” “Even if you go and find out it’s something that you don't like, that could be just as valuable.” 
When talking to my friends, who are also currently on  work experience too, there was no one strongly disagreeing with my point. They all believe that it is beneficial for all young people’s futures. One suggesting that “it can prepare you for later life and that it expands your knowledge.” Another stating that “I love work experience because it’s giving me a taste of what it will be like when I start working, I’ve also got to meet new people, improving my communication skills.”

However, in contrast to those points, one of my friends said that “work experience was okay because we had the week off of school, but if you don't know what to do when leaving school it could be a bit useless.” In some ways this is true since it could make decisions tougher to navigate when having no idea what you want to do post-school; nevertheless work experience does give you a kind of springboard, in that you can decide to explore the field you experienced, more in-depth or not. 
Even if you did have a bad work experience, which I definitely cannot relate to, it would still benefit you since you would then know what field not to pursue. 
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So, in conclusion, I believe that work experience is extremely beneficial because as I said before, it could really shape your or your children's future. Growing up and having to live and work in the ‘real world’ can be very scary, for everyone, but if you enjoy and know what field you want to go in, it would make the whole process of leaving school, going to further and or higher education and getting a job easier. Personally, I believe everyone should participate in work experience as it could really be helpful in any young persons future career. 

Author

I am an aspiring Beauty Journalist who would love to work for Vogue. Currently, I am in year ten doing English and Media GCSE to further my dreams. After this week of work experience I am now reviewing my next steps to making this dream a reality.

- Lily Gregory