Futures: Oxbridge (the students' perspective)
Kingston Grammar School (KGS)recently joined forces with The Kingston Academy (TKA) in a cross-sector partnership to provide free inspirational and aspirational careers, coaching, education and university advice.
The partnership is called Futures and it aims to deliver twice-termly events which can be accessed by any secondary school-age students in the local community. Students are offered up-to-date careers advice as well as guidance from universities and employers.
The first partnership project was The TKA/KGS Futures Oxbridge Exploding The Myth Campaign. Launched in December 2020, its first event was held on February 9th 2021.
9th February 2021
Oxbridge: Myth versus Reality
The main aim of the event was to raise awareness amongst academically able teenagers from all backgrounds and schools in the borough about applying to Oxbridge. This involved 9 KGS alumni and 6 Ambassadors from Somerville College, Oxford. They talked candidly about their experiences of navigating the Oxbridge process and talked through some of the challenges they faced, addressing some of the myths and realities relating to their experiences of the application process and studying at Oxford and Cambridge.
23rd March 2021
The Application Process
This will involve representative from both Oxford and Cambridge who will talk about the application process. It will also involve a live Q & A session with the students featured in the first event.
Aims
Main Aim
To provide free inspirational and aspiration careers education and higher education advice through twice termly events to any student/parent living in the Kingston area.
For this event the main aims were:
To create awareness about the FREE Oxbridge event.
To engage our target audience of local, external, academically able 14-15-year-old GCSE students who are interested in applying to Oxbridge but don’t know how.
To further create awareness of the partnership between The Kingston Academy and Kingston Grammar School.
To publicise that these events are open to all and are free of charge.
Background
This partnership built on our previous work with the 'Is There a Doctor in the House' event
Resources
This virtual event attracted 482 registrations, with 350 attending the live event.
The original plan was to hope one event at each school per term, but because of COVID restrictions we decided to run this as a virtual event. In reality this increased access and would be a consideration going forward.
Pupil Involvement
This event was designed for students in Year 10, 11 and 12.
74% from state schools and 26% from independent schools
Parents were also encouraged to join
This event attracted 350 attendees
82 were from KGS
30 were from TKA
Over 100 people accessed the YouTube link within 72 hours of publication
Frequency
This is an on-going activity
Twice termly events:
Spring 2021 - 2 events on Oxbridge
Summer 2021 - Engineering
