Insight

Parents and the career guidance of their children

Gatsby‘s new report, in partnership with Opinium, looks at how parents’* engage with the careers activities of their children, their preferences for communications, and also how these have changed because of the Coronavirus pandemic.

This latest report outlines findings from a survey of 2,001 parents of secondary school students (11-18 years olds) carried out in autumn 2020. Comparisons are made with previous research carried out in August 2019, which also surveyed 2,050 parents with very similar demographics (gender, age, location, ethnicity, Ofsted rating of school/college, age of child(ren). This original piece of research used attitudinal segmentation analysis to identify six parent profile groups, to help ensure support and communications were tailored to the needs of different parents.

One of the key findings of this report is that an increasing number of parents are concerned about their child’s future and are feeling disengaged. Parents are also heavily reliant on their own experiences to inform education and career conversations with their children. That said,  there is high satisfaction with how schools and colleges have performed during the pandemic, a willingness to engage in careers activities and receive a wide variety of communications from schools and colleges.

Read the full report here.

*When using the term parents, we are also referring to carers and guardians