Unlocking Opportunity: Building the UK’s Future Workforce

Young people across the UK continue to face unequal access to meaningful work experience and career insight, even as employers report growing skills shortages. Structural barriers (including geography, cost, safeguarding and limited professional networks) mean too many students are unable to access high-quality opportunities before leaving education.

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Hosted at the House of Lords, this event will give young people the floor to tell us what they need, what motivates them and what they think makes work experience meaningful. We'll be bringing together policymakers, education leaders, young people and employers to examine the evidence, innovation and delivery models driving scalable impact.

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Springpod will also be launching our latest Social Return on Investment (SROI) research at the event. Using this research, national initiatives and real-world case studies, we will explore how access to opportunity can and should be embedded as part of the UK’s national infrastructure.

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The three complementary elements that illustrate the full picture of opportunity at scale:

• The why - Measuring impact through SROI
• The how - Scaling access through the Big Work Experience Challenge
• The what - Future-ready delivery through innovative career experiences