Careers Advice for SEND: Independent Guidance & Support

Absolute Inclusion is proud to collaborate with YES Careers, merging specialist SEND expertise with high-quality careers education mentoring and employment support. Through this partnership, learners can access independent careers advice, personalized Careers Action Plans, mentoring, work experience, and supported placement opportunities. Our support is designed to help young people understand their strengths, explore realistic and aspirational pathways, and build the confidence and skills needed for further education, training, and employment. YES Careers also offers the online World of Work course and an online skills-building portal, providing learners with structured opportunities to develop employability skills, understand workplace expectations, and prepare for future pathways at their own pace. Together, Absolute Inclusion and YES Careers deliver a more robust and inclusive careers education mentoring program for schools, colleges, and specialist settings, connecting SEND support, careers planning, work experience, and preparation for adulthood. Our shared aim is to ensure every learner has a clear plan, meaningful opportunities, and the practical skills and confidence needed to transition successfully into their next stage.

Absolute Inclusion supports schools and specialist settings to develop purposeful, inclusive, and sustainable careers education mentoring aligned with the Gatsby Benchmarks and shaped around the needs of their learners. In one specialist setting, we developed a comprehensive careers offer, which included a high-quality careers website section detailing the school’s vision, learner entitlement, programme of activities, work experience, and Preparing for Adulthood. We also implemented an internal enterprise provision for learners who were not yet ready for external work experience. This initiative provided some of the school’s most vulnerable learners with a safe environment to build confidence, independence, and employability skills through practical experience in customer service, food preparation, hygiene, purchasing, stock management, money handling, and basic profit and loss. Our approach was reinforced through staff training, practical resources, and ongoing guidance, ensuring that independent careers advice was consistently delivered and sustained beyond the consultancy period. This work enhanced links between curriculum learning, workplace encounters, personalised careers planning, and preparation for adulthood, while making certain that learners who needed a more gradual pathway were not excluded from meaningful careers experiences, benefiting from our SEND expertise.

Absolute Inclusion supports schools and specialist settings to develop purposeful, inclusive, and sustainable careers education mentoring aligned with the Gatsby Benchmarks and shaped around the needs of their learners. In one specialist setting, we developed a comprehensive careers offer, which included a high-quality careers website section detailing the school’s vision, learner entitlement, programme of activities, work experience, and Preparing for Adulthood. We also implemented an internal enterprise provision for learners who were not yet ready for external work experience. This initiative provided some of the school’s most vulnerable learners with a safe environment to build confidence, independence, and employability skills through practical experience in customer service, food preparation, hygiene, purchasing, stock management, money handling, and basic profit and loss. Our approach was reinforced through staff training, practical resources, and ongoing guidance, ensuring that independent careers advice was consistently delivered and sustained beyond the consultancy period. This work enhanced links between curriculum learning, workplace encounters, personalised careers planning, and preparation for adulthood, while making certain that learners who needed a more gradual pathway were not excluded from meaningful careers experiences, benefiting from our SEND expertise.