Inspiring the future workforce: The Liverpool City Region Work Experience Event

Inspiring the future workforce: The Liverpool City Region Work Experience Event

By Lucy Irwin, CMCA Senior Project Manager

The demand for work experience placements in clinical and non-clinical environments across the Liverpool City Region (LCR) is high, with hundreds of requests made each year. However, in-person opportunities are limited due to capacity constraints in practice settings.

This scarcity of placements has resulted in a lack of opportunities for young people to gain first-hand experience in health and care environments, hindering their ability to make informed decisions about pursuing careers in these fields.

Data from the regional Talent For Care reports for the last three quarters since the start of 2023 reveal that only nine young people under the age of 16 could access in-person work experience, underscoring the urgent need to address this gap and provide more opportunities for aspiring healthcare professionals.

In response to the challenges faced in providing work experience opportunities for students in the city region, NHS England (NHSE) and the LCR joined forces to organise a five-day Experience Of The Workplace event.

This initiative aimed to offer 250 Year 10 students from across LCR the opportunity to gain valuable insights into the healthcare industry, with a particular focus on schools that fall below average in meeting Gatsby Benchmarks five and six, meaning that they need support in achieving encounters with employers and employees and giving their students experiences of workplace environments.

The event took place in June at Liverpool Hope University and was a work experience like no other. The week-long event brought together NHS staff from across the region to provide students with an insight into their roles.

Led by NHS England, CMCA was approached by the organisers to lead and coordinate the cancer services element of the event.

Working in collaboration with the fantastic staff at The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre NHS Foundation Trust, Wirral CIC, and Macmillan, we designed a packed week for the students, with the primary focus to highlight the supportive and assistive roles within cancer services, offering students a comprehensive understanding of the numerous opportunities available in the healthcare sector.

Experience Of The Workplace Timetable

The students in attendance had selected cancer services as an area of interest and followed an application process set out by the team at NHSE. This had a positive impact and was clear to see with the levels of engagement from the 14 and 15-year-old students, the fantastic questions they asked staff, their existing knowledge about cancer and their future career plans.

We had a total of 21 students in our cancer services home group who received seven sessions across the week.

We also facilitated four visiting home groups made up of students who had selected other NHS services as their first choice and presented them with a session that included an introduction to cancer and roles within cancer services to give them a broad overview.

“The event was a fantastic opportunity for young people in the LCR to gain exposure to a huge range of potential healthcare careers and it was great for us at The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre to be able to promote careers in cancer care and to meet enthusiastic young people who may be employees of the future” –  Pauline Pilkington, Head of Clinical Education and Professional Development, Therapeutic Radiographer

We had a staggering 32 members of staff in attendance throughout the week. Their involvement was instrumental in ensuring a diverse range of roles in cancer services were presented and that the sessions were tailored to be informative and relevant to the students.

“The event was a real opportunity to showcase The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre for the incredible organisation that it is. The response from the CCC team was wonderful, despite busy workloads, staff from right across the organisation came together to design a full week of work experience for 250 children! I think for me what we did really well was demonstrate our passion to patient care to the young people. They seemed genuinely interested in the range of career opportunities cancer services can provide and the unique driver behind them all is that deep connection to patient care ... it was exciting to see the next generation of cancer services professionals light up at the possibilities” – Alexandra Gilbertson, AHP and Nursing Workforce Development Lead, Highly Specialist Oncology Physiotherapist at The Clatterbridge Cancer Centre NHS Foundation Trust

In total, we showcased 22 careers that support patients along their cancer pathway. To further highlight these roles to the students, digital job profiles were created and hosted on The Cancer Academy website (see Liverpool City Region Experience of the Workforce Event – Cancer Academy).

Each job profile provided students with a summary of the fundamentals of the role, the entry requirements in terms of qualifications and experience and the salary.

Access to the digital profiles was provided via a QR code at regular points during the event. Data has confirmed that the page was accessed a total number of 81 times via the QR code.

It was an absolute privilege to witness the students grow in confidence daily, building relationships with their peers and genuinely taking an interest in the roles within cancer.

Feedback was gathered from students who attended the event with the following findings:

• There was a total of 91 responses from the week.
• How interesting they found the sessions on a rate of 1 to 5 (1 being not and 5 being very)
  • 96% of students overall selected 3+
• Would they consider a career in cancer services?
  • 98% of students overall selected ‘yes’ or ‘maybe’ 

  

• Cancer overview groups were asked whether they had learnt anything new
  • 100% of the students said ‘yes’

One of the students remarked: “Thank you for this week and for being someone we all knew we could go to if we were struggling or if we needed that extra bit of support because this week has been especially difficult for some of us. Thank you for the restorative chat every morning reassuring us for the day ahead. Even though we only knew you for a week you have managed to shape all of our little minds into making positive decisions. From the whole cancer services home group.”

Inspiring the future workforce is a key deliverable for the Cancer Alliance as part of our Workforce programme. Our aim moving forward is to continue to work with partner organisations to inspire and educate the next generation of healthcare professionals, linking in with the NHS’s Aspirant Cancer Career and Education Development (ACCEND) programme career pathways.

I really hope to see some of the brilliant students who attended the LCR event working in cancer services in the future and wish them all the best!