BBC London interviews CCC students, colleagues and employers about new youth unemployment figures

Yesterday, journalists from BBC London visited Capital City College’s King’s Cross campus. They spoke with students, alumni, CCC colleagues and employer partners about new figures on youth unemployment released by the Office for National Statistics (ONS).

The reporters first spoke to Jasbir Sondhi, Group Principal for Capital City College, for BBC London radio, as well as two employer partners:

• Jenny Barber, Director of Careers and Talent at Investment20/20, and
• Andrew Green, CEO of the Craft Guild of Chefs.

They talked about what the new unemployment figures mean for young people hoping to start careers.

The BBC team also interviewed Manuela Gutierrez, a former BTEC Business student at CCC who now works for Polar Capital. Journalists then met current students to hear their thoughts on the new figures, how they feel about youth unemployment today, and what they hope for in the future.

Jasbir Sondhi, Group Principal for Young People, English, Mathematics and SEND at CCC, discussed the rising figures and explained it’s about navigating the ever-changing labour market and helping young people gain the resilience to keep going: “I think that’s why it’s so important for us here to ensure that from day one, our young people have access to networks, mentoring, work experience, industry placements.

“And what we’ve found is that those young people who have work experience as sort of a core part of their programme, in the end make more informed choices about their next steps and actually a number of them then get to get a part-time job, a number go into full-time employment. For me the thing is understanding the labour market, being able to navigate it, but also having access to these opportunities as well.”

You can listen back to the interviews on BBC Sounds (from 1 hour, 9 minutes). The story also appeared on BBC London TV and the BBC London live blog.

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