Session 2: Teacher and Employer Perspectives

The second session offers perspectives from a teacher and an employer who both participated in teacher externships.

Alison Waverly (Chemistry Teacher, Aylesbury High School) shared her account of participating in an externship at Wycombe Hospital, an opportunity that allowed her to guide students towards more diverse biomedical careers. Nyle Chapman (Learning and Development Officer, Micronclean) highlighted his company’s motivations for engaging with teacher externships and the impact they are having.

Alison Waverley’s Experience as a Chemistry Teacher

Alison Waverley teaches general science (KS3) and Chemistry A-Level at Aylesbury High School, a selective state grammar school with 1,300+ academically ambitious students.
Many students aspire to study medicine, but not all are suited to it. Recently, 44 students applied for medicine courses, 33 were initially confirmed places and 13 eventually secured these after meeting grade requirements.
Alison undertook an externship at Wycombe Hospital to explore alternative biomedical career pathways beyond just becoming a doctor, nurse, dentist, or veterinarian.
During the externship, Alison visited various NHS departments. This included the cardiac/stroke unit, learning about pharmaceutical research roles (such as running clinical trials for new drugs) and visiting Cytology to see how tissue samples are prepared for cancer diagnosis.
The equipment she saw being used, such as MRI machines in the Radiology apartment, allowed her to identify direct links to A-level teaching concepts around nuclear magnetic resonance.
Alison also learned about the many entry routes in the sector and the flexibility of career progression within the NHS.

Benefits for Alison and her school:

The visit increased Alison’s confidence in advising students on available biomedical roles and job pathways, helping her to broaden students' outlooks beyond a narrow focus on ‘traditional’ medical careers.
The visit connected theoretical concepts to real-world practice, allowing her to tailor her lessons accordingly.
The visit offered a clearer understanding of NHS recruitment procedures, including the potential availability of financial support.
Alison plans to invite NHS staff to the school to speak to students, and now uses resources from the externship in her lessons.

Nyle Chapman’s Perspective as an Employer

Nyle is the Learning and Development Officer at Micronclean, a cleanroom technology company that serves the NHS, pharmaceutical industry, and other sectors that require sterile manufacturing environments.
Originally a laundry service called Fenland Laundries, Micronclean now specialises in controlled particle/bacteria cleanrooms, laundering sterile garments for manufacturing, and producing consumable products like syringes, white alcohol and hand sanitiser.
A key goal for Micronclean is to raise local awareness of their diverse career opportunities and to shift the outdated perception that they are ‘just a laundry company’. They offer roles spanning science, engineering, IT, customer service, sales, HR and more.
Micronclean engages with local schools through open days, presentations, and by hosting student visits on-site for work experience days.
In June 2023, they hosted 5 schools for teacher externships to showcase different business areas and will host again in 2024 and going forward.

Benefits for Micronclean:

They can directly convey useful information about available roles at the company, and the skills/qualifications required to fulfil them. In turn, educators can alert young people to these skills gaps and even weave them into the curriculum if appropriate.
Both through teacher encounters and student work experience days, the company is giving young people in the local region hands-on experience in workplace environments beyond the classroom.
Teacher encounters allow the company to contribute to a future talent pipeline by raising early awareness of local career pathways. This supports both Micronclean’s company objectives but also helps the local economy in Skegness, an economically disadvantaged region of the country that needs to keep talent locally.
They already employ young people who had previously been on the receiving end of work experience and hope that teacher encounters will support this even further.