Inspiring Futures
Bringing employer engagement into elementary and high schools.
Inspiring Futures is a career-related learning, volunteer-based program, bringing together underrepresented (BIPOC) industry professionals to inspire and to engage students from equity deserving communities. This evidence based concept has proven to raise youth aspirations, broaden horizons, challenge gender, socioeconomic and ethnic biases at an earlier age, provide a link between education and employment, and encourages a positive outlook on school.
“A key source of motivation for students to study hard is to realise their dreams for work and life. Those dreams and aspirations, in turn, do not just depend on students’ talents, but they can be hugely influenced by the personal background of students … as well as by the depth and breadth of their knowledge about the world of work. In a nutshell, students cannot be what they cannot see.” (OECD)
Connect with us to learn more about how we can support your students, Specialist High Skills Major (SHSM) Programs, and the Ontario Investing in Students plan through our tailored programming, including industry panels, soft skills development, field trips, and an introduction to financial literacy.
“Students cannot be what they cannot see.”
Organisation for Economic Co-operation and Development
Access to Opportunity
The MINA Project believes that all youth should have the opportunity to hear first-hand about a variety of career paths and experience the world of work. A young person’s background should not determine their chances of getting these opportunities. Instead the aim is to show children and youth the vast range of opportunities open to them and ensure they don’t start ruling out options for themselves at a young age.
From app designers to neurologists, product managers to CEOs, volunteers from equity deserving communities give their time to share their career story with a local school or group in underserved communities. Such diverse and inclusive interactions have a positive impact on young people’s academic achievement and outcomes for employment and earning potential, and help secure Toronto’s workforce for the future.
The MINA Project is proud to be a Toronto District School Board Educational Partner. The Inspiring Futures tailored programming is open to elementary through to high school classes and clubs, as well community organizations. Our goal is to curate panels and workshops that interest your students, helping to raise aspirations and broaden horizons. This program supports the Ontario 2022 Catch Up Plan by helping prepare students for the jobs of tomorrow.
Why Starting Early is Important
Drawing the Future: Findings from an international survey that offers an opportunity to explore who primary-age children ideally want to become, and, what shapes (and often limits) their career aspirations and dreams for the future.
Embedding experiences of the real-world in learning and the school curriculum can lead to increased motivation resulting in increased educational achievement.
Unconscious Biases
Gender, cultural and socio-economic stereotypes exist from age 7
In terms of gender stereotyping and gendered career expectations, aspirations do tend to lay in stereotypical masculine/feminine roles across the sample. One of the most popular jobs for boys across our sample is often police and armed forces while teaching emerges as one of the most popular professions for girls.
The trends for STEM related aspirations is largely similar. In keeping with popular theories around masculine and feminine roles, boys in our samples have preference for working with things, for example working as an Engineer or Scientist whereas girls seem to aspire to jobs working with people/caring professions for example working as a teacher, nurse, doctor or vet.
Aspirational Influence
Aspirations are influenced by socio-economic background
The general trends suggest that in some developing countries children have more practical and high professional ambitions (e.g. doctor and teacher), whereas in developed countries aspirations are often formed around celebrity culture (e.g. professional athlete, a career in social media and gaming).
Early intervention can be a very cost effective targeted way of raising children’s’ aspirations and broadening their horizons. The evidence suggests that giving children the chance to meet volunteers from the world helps them to see the meaning and relevance of the subjects they are studying at school work.
Jobs of the Future
Disconnect between aspirations of children and predicted jobs of the future
The research finds a major disconnect between the careers that primary-age children are most interested in and those that the economy needs.
A similar misalignment is also evident among young people in secondary school, contrary to arguments that career aspirations of children are transient, changing and should ultimately be ignored.
A new report on the disconnect of career aspirations and jobs in youth, have found that students that benefit from career activities and influences in high school have better career aspirations connected to the labour market.
After Career-Related Learning Programming
Benefits in areas like career aspirations, attendance, and achievement, particularly for disadvantaged students, were identified
82 % of children agreed that “I now understand how learning Math/English/Science can be useful in many jobs
90% of elementary school teachers agreed that “involvement in activities with employers” would impact the academic achievement of students
When they engage with children, volunteers are routinely perceived as speaking from a vantage point of real authority. Who better to testify how numeracy is used outside of the classroom, after all than someone who earns a paycheck to apply it in a workplace? Volunteers from the world of work can also play a key role in providing children with role models and tackling stereotyping around gender and ethnicity and help ensure that children at a young age don’t start ruling out options for themselves.
— Nick Chambers, Dr Elnaz T Kashefpakdel, Jordan Rehill, Christian Percy