Support for careers leads to write a case study

Case studies and helpful guidance for writing your own school case study.

Why is a case study important?

Case studies are a recognised marketing and communications tool, but they are equally effective as a tool for evidencing and evaluating the careers activity that is taking place in your establishment. It is important that all activities are evaluated to review their impact on students and evidenced to showcase best practice and highlight the range of activities that are taking place.

Centrally, the Worcestershire Careers Hub delivery team use case studies as exemplars of good practice within the local network and both regionally and nationally. With this in mind, it is important that we collect the relevant information. This guidance aims to support you in writing a standout case study in order to ensure your educational establishment is getting the recognition it deserves for the careers related activities carried out.

In order to ensure your case studies stands out and contains all the information required, please consider the 3 steps below when completing the case study template.

Top Tip:

Case studies are a great resource to complete and store as evidence and supporting documents for your compass results. Detailed case studies will also provide OFSTED with solid evidence of your institutes career strategy.

Read our case study example from Dyson Perrins CEC Academy

Case Study Guidance

In the write up section of the template add the following text:

1. Activity Aims:

Start your case study with a detailed explanation of the aims you set out to achieve through this activity.

Examples might be:

increasing encounters in the curriculum
increasing employer engagement
raising students’ aspirations
raising industry sectors profiles and appeal to students
providing students with LMI learning
benchmark criteria specific activity (which benchmark? Which aspect of the benchmark are you aiming to address with this activity?)

2. Activity Detail:

Provide a detailed description of the activity carried out, points to consider could be:

what was the activity called?
what was the activity? (provide as much detail as possible)
who was involved? (if employers or external providers supported the activity- who were they? How many did you invite? how many attended?)

3. Measure and Impact

It is important to record the success of the activity and how this was measured, also consider what impact the activity or encounter has had on the targeted students. Highlight what is different as a result of the case study and consider the following:

impact on benchmark progress
impact on participating student’s skills and knowledge
feedback from participants and stakeholders
compass progress results

What went well and what could be better?

Highlight your reflections on the activity, what went well and what would you do differently if the activity is repeated?

Quotes from participants:

Please provide quotes from participants, ideally one from each of the types of participants involved. Quotes are useful for PR and Comms purpose but are equally helpful in creating a sense of the value of the encounter or activity for those involved and raising the profile of those involved.

Don’t forget to add pictures and use social media platforms such as twitter to further promote the activities taking place within your educational establishment. Tag us in your tweets! @CEC_Worcs

Please send your completed case studies to your Enterprise Coordinator in order for them to share and promote accordingly.