Work experience is valuable. That is not usually where the disagreement lies.
The more interesting question is what young people are actually meant to experience when they enter a workplace.
A recent first-person account by the executive principal of Sandy Secondary School in Bedfordshire describes a Year 9 pupil taking part in a six-week career-skills programme at ZSL Whipsnade Zoo. At that stage, choices about subjects, training and careers are still taking shape. Exposure of that kind may help a young person form a more concrete sense of what work is before they are asked to decide where they might fit within it.
Updated statutory guidance now asks schools in England to begin reforming provision from this September, with work-experience activities in Years 7 to 9 and placements in Years 10 and 11. It defines meaningful activity through a shared purpose, genuine interaction with employers and sufficient time. The remaining question is what young people are actually able to observe and practise once the experience begins.
A placement can show a young person where work happens without necessarily showing them how work happens.
On a placement, they may see the building, the job titles, the equipment, the professional language and the formal tasks, and leave with a clearer sense of a sector. That matters. Much of the learning, however, sits in things that are harder to show: how a problem is framed, how a decision is made with incomplete information, how disagreement is handled, why an apparently good idea is rejected, when someone asks for expertise they do not have, and how feedback changes the work.
These are often the things experienced people do almost without naming them.
We have seen this in student learning activities too. The most useful moment is not always the final idea or finished output. It is often the point at which a young person hears feedback, realises the first answer was too simple, and has to explain what they would now change.
The same question appears in the changing profile of apprenticeships.
Apprenticeships provide a structured route into work. At their best, they combine learning, supervision, responsibility and repeated exposure to real organisational expectations. They can provide sustained contact with practice in a way that classroom learning or a short placement usually cannot.
Department for Education final data for 2024/25 show that intermediate apprenticeships accounted for about 19% of starts in England, down from 43% in 2017/18. Over the same period, higher-level apprenticeships grew from 13% to around 40% of starts.
Higher-level apprenticeships meet important needs for progression and development throughout working life. These figures do not tell us, on their own, whether there are fewer opportunities for young people entering work. They do raise a practical question about where gradual, supported first steps are available.
Foundation apprenticeships, introduced in August 2025, are one attempt to provide a more supported entry point for younger people. It is too early to know how widely they will offer the developmental experience considered here.
A route can still exist institutionally while doing less of the developmental work it was meant to do.
The nature of those first steps is also changing as AI alters some of the tasks traditionally given to junior people. Routine work has often carried more developmental value than it was given credit for. Drafting a first version, checking information, preparing a summary, making a small mistake and having it corrected: these were not glamorous tasks, but they allowed someone to see how judgement forms in context.
If some of those tasks are now done faster by AI, or by more experienced people using AI, the loss is not only a task. It may also be a loss of practice.
That does not mean young people should be given artificial work to preserve old routes into employment. It suggests that employers and educators need to be more deliberate about what early exposure is for. If someone is not close enough to the reasoning, the trade-offs and the consequences, they see activity without encountering practice.
For organisations asked to support talent pipelines, the pressure is often measured in the number of placements or apprenticeships offered and the number of young people reached. Those figures matter, but they do not answer the whole question.
Time spent with an employer can still leave a young person without seeing how the work is judged or why one decision was better than another. They may see professional confidence without seeing the uncertainty behind it.
Useful experience can begin with a small problem and enough context to understand why it matters. It can also come from hearing colleagues think differently about the same issue, or seeing why a piece of work had to change.
The employer question is therefore more demanding than "can we host someone?" It is: what part of our work can a young person safely get close enough to learn from?
Disclaimer: This article reflects EFEC's perspective on skills, workforce and capability development, informed by engagement with education, employers and innovation partners. It is intended to contribute to wider discussion and does not constitute advice or represent the official position of any organisation referenced.
Image: Illustrative image: supported workplace experience can help young people encounter how decisions are made in practice.
