Secondary students exposed to career opportunities through school fairs |12 July 2023

Independent School

As part of activities to mark Careers Week, launched on Monday, schools have taken the initiative to hold careers fair on their campus for students.

One of them was the Independent School, which held its first ever half-day careers fair yesterday, with the aim of exposing students to the different career opportunities in the country, and inspiring them to make good career choices in future.

The Independent School’s careers coordinator and spokesperson for the careers committee, Bernice Docteur, said the purpose of having the fair at the school was to bring the organisations closer to the students and give all of them the opportunity to interact, ask questions and clarify their doubts.

“This is so that they know, in the future, as they make their career choices, which one is the best for them,” she stated.

The Independent School careers fair had organisations such as the Indian Ocean Tuna, Seychelles Broadcasting Corporation, Nouvobanq, Aquaculture among others.

Other than guiding their own students, Independent School had also invited other public schools to view the fair, including the neighbouring Perseverance secondary.

Joshua Anderson, the head boy at Perseverance secondary school, said he was attending the fair to observe and accumulate as much information as possible from different organisations, which would then be shared with his peers.

“This fair is very helpful especially to S4 and S5 students. I have passed by the different stations and asked what IGCSEs are needed to work in such a field and now I can share that knowledge to students that are interested in the line of work so they know which subjects to choose and the IGCSE needed,” he explained.

A second school that hosted a careers fair yesterday was the English River secondary, which focused mainly on careers within the maritime sector.

The school took this interesting approach for the simple reason that the management noticed the students’ eagerness, passion and fascination with maritime careers. The initiative of focusing on one sector at a time creates the opportunity for the students to be well versed with specific career choices.

The head of department for Careers Guidance, Kerina Michelle, explained that the careers fair does not just end there but actually moves to the Careers period in class where they would discuss more on what they gained from the fair and the organisations.

“We help students from when they enter S1 up until S5, we keep track of their progress which allows them to evaluate themselves, therefore making better decision in the future,” she explained.

The fair saw the participation of three organizations namely, the Blue Economy department, the Seychelles Coast Guard and the Marine Police. These will be followed by professional talks in classes from other partners in other fields.

The deputy head teacher, Ted Arrisol, said that the students’ exposure to these different career choices is important because many are not aware of the different jobs within a certain sector.

“We look closely after the interest of our students but we also look at the country’s needs and demands. We try to associate the two by educating the students on these demands which sparks their interests and decreased the chance of their disappointment when they leave school,” he concluded.

The week-long Careers Week organised by the Ministry of Education will comprise fairs, talks, workplace visits and job shadowing among others.

Diane Larame

Photos by Louis Toussaint