Harsh opinion - is it fair to give work experience to students who in reality haven't the academic ability to enter the profession e.g. medcine?

[mids2019]

I work in a large NHSq trust and we are continually being asked by our widening participation team to take on work experience students for a range of medical careers including clinical science and medicine.
A lot of the children unfortunately are forecast 3/4/5s at GCSE yet schools and the widening participation team keep saying we should be giving work experience to these children who in reality won't be qualified for some professiions out of what I see is a misguided sense of fairness.

The medics push back at this saying they simply have no time and time would be wasted enthusing a child about a profession they would be unlikely to be able to do.

The medics are quite happy to take students from a locally high performing grammar school as a matter of course unofficially (and often due to parental connections)

I think this is it. Work experience doesn't work because firms aren't in the position to give meaningful work experience and the beaurocracy is horrendous. Yes in a utopian world all firms should be offering experience equitably but in my experience they can't.

Don’t know anyone they got on an official work experience placement they are like hens teeth. Everyone I know went to work with parents / extended family / close friends.

With respect I’m not the one who is confused.

Kent is not the only area with selection, Bucks is too. Equally there are some random state grammar schools in comprehensive areas, rare as hen’s teeth but they do exist. I did not “mention” Kingston Grammar school, which is not a state school, I mentioned the London borough of Kingston as having a couple of state grammars which it does - Tiffin’s.

I’d have thought that hanging around doctors would be the surest way to put people off studying medicine.

But is work experience really about trying to get experience in a field they are interested in. I thought it was simply to get experience of work more generally. I have a friend who organises work experience in my organisation and am pretty sure none of the kids are interested in working there in the future.

My own DC did work experience in my organisation and I think they had an amazing experience but I would be very surprised if they ended up working in my organisation or a similar one and yet they valued the experience.

In an ideal world they get experience in an area they are interested in but do 16yr olds really know what they want to do when they are older?

The problem is not widening participation. It is that the burden of the scheme seems to be landing on medics rather than the wider medical environment. As has been pointed out by another poster there are lots of options in the medical field beyond being a doctor.

I’m not a doctor but in another profession (law) where there is an expectation of work experience. I and most of my colleagues are happy to do it but it does come at a cost. When I was employed it often meant having to stay late to do my work because my office hours had been occupied by supporting someone on work experience. Now I’m self-employed it can hit me in my bank account as well as I will get less work done on those days. I support work experience as it is the right thing to do, but it would be frustrating to do it first those with no interest or realistic prospect of working in the legal field.

I was predicted a D’s in GCSE Science - I actually got an A’s … I was actually having an incredibly hard time for other reasons in Yr10 and was doing much better by Y11.

I am SO glad people didn’t just write me off based on my 14/15yr old self.

I now have an MSc and am doing a PhD in H&SC …. I work with young people in “deprived” areas and at a Uni with Nursing students.

I fully intend on continue to widen participation and reduce gaps in access to opportunities in every way I can!!

I think it’s a bit of a non problem. Mostly people on lower grades who themselves think those grades are fair don’t want to go on work experience for courses they are unlikely get into.

Have you thought about creating an "application form" for work experience? You can then make an informed judgement on whether the child in question has the aptitude and ambition to be a HCP or whether they've just watched a few episodes of House and fancy themselves in a white coat.

Did it have to be with actual doctors or could it have been care work etc.? Because those are medical roles and I'm sure you could get work experience in care.

@WhatK8DidNext But you are not a medical doctor and didn’t need work experience with doctors. Any charity would have been fine. There’s all sorts of phds available but they aren’t the same. You are not selected at 18.

It’s part of giving back.
the students you have written off may well make it, just later.
Its not your place to judge if they are worth it

There don't seem to be floods of children wanting work experience in nursing. A lot of my daughter's friends have been put off by some anecdotes from working nurses and some don't want a stereotypical 'woman's job'.

It seems schools (as has been articulated above) don't want to seem non inclusive and therefore will support their pupils getting any sort of work placement. Problem is if you suddenly have a lot of kids wanting to shadow doctors, scientists, actors, barristers as examples of aspirational career choices how do you manage it?

I think having grade requirements for work experience is a terrible idea. It just perpetuates the idea that at 15 your test results will determine your entire future- which is not true. I think you should seperate yourself and not get as involved and just show the kids what it’s like to do your job. Their chances of doing the role are nothing to do with you. It’s also disturbing as a doctor or scientist that you actually believe that academic ability is accurately represented in GCSE results.

@Gottogetmyflyzone GCSE results really will determine A levels and application for medical school!

My point was about not judging kids at 14/15 and limiting their opportunities at such a young age based your view of what they may be capable of.

I think maybe a healthcare assistant could be in charge of the less qualified kids and give them experience of this role?
Or you could have minimum grades for the doctor role?

@WhatK8DidNext The thread is about being a medical doctor. The career choices of DC getting grade 3/4 at GCSE or even 5s at GCSE are limited! They won’t be getting A levels at the required grades. By all means do something else and succeed or be a career changer but schools don’t grade dc 3/4 when they will get an 8/9 in the hard sciences. Just vanishingly rare. If dc are having a peek at a hospital, is that really worth anything at 14/15? It’s not really limiting much apart from maybe the ones who are bright enough but don’t get the gig? What about them?

You've got to love the gatekeeping going on in this thread. What you should do is base it on predictive grades.

@FanfictionFan They do but think 3/4 at GCSE is ok for shadowing doctors for a medical degree. With limited supply of expensive WE placements and obvious opportunity costs, it does seem to be misplaced optimism not to filter applicants.

@TizerorFizz

I agree.

Medics are just an example but it puts them off hosting work experience if they just have kids that like Holby city but don't know an alkali from an acid.

Everyone feels time is wasted and often there is a feeling due to resources your not getting the kids through that really have the ability and could be swayed towards medicine.

It makes you look like the 'bad guy' saying that but the current we system is a mess.

You are assuming what grades they will get based on predictions when they are 14 … predictions that in my case were wrong.

I am not a medical doctor, but I am using myself as an example of how judgements can be wrong and potentially damaging.

Who administers the work experience placements, @mids2019?

Most trusts have work experience short placements of 1-2 weeks for students age 16+ where the student applies directly for a specific role (eg to shadow a doctor, nurse, midwife, HCA, radiographer, OT etc and sometimes for a particular specialism eg cardiology, paediatrics etc) and there are a limited number of places. The schemes are run by the trust so they set the requirements when allocating spaces to the (usually) oversubscribed placements.

Or is this a scheme where the school has an arrangement with the trust for work experience and allocates the students for Year 10 work placements? I have personal experience of that not working well… 😂 Anyone seen the work experience episode of The Inbetweeners? 😂

I honestly find the requiremrnt for prospective med students to have relevant work experience to be utterly bizarre. It’s a huge waste of a medic’s time to (effectively) babysit someone who potentially isn’t even 18. If you don’t have connections or access to someone who can offer that experience then like your daughter, you’re effectively barred from the profession before you even get entry to the degree.

We don’t insist that potential lawyers/accountants/chartered surveyors trail around after someone for a week or two.

Also, as a patient I certainly don’t want a 17 year old watching my treatment.

I'm not so sure. I went to a private school that was a sausage factory for doctors. Very few of them were in it because of any desire to treat people. - most wanted status and money. I can't think of anything worse than being operated on by them! They got all the qualifications because they paid for them and our school spoon fed them.

I think there does need to be a wider net. Some people that would be fabulous doctors can't be because they can't get the level of education to get in that they need. The very fact the people are excluding people on the basis of gcse expectations is sad.