When you’re 16 and you’ve just finished school in the UK, it’s very tempting to burn all your books, and go out and find a job - so you can finally get some money in your pocket!

This may turn out to be a bad idea. GCSEs, the qualifications you gain at the end of your formal education, will not guarantee you a great job in the UK– last year there was an almost 100% pass-rate, and one in five students got the top grade.

So, because employers look for a higher level of education, you will probably find that you have to start off at the bottom and work your way up, unless you choose to take your studies to a higher level.

Schooling beyond Sixteen

The government is already making plans to extend the compulsory school age in the UK to 18, so that everyone is educated to a higher standard. And in a climate in which competition for the best jobs is fierce, with around 40% of young people continuing on to university, you will benefit from all the qualifications you can get!

If you do choose not to go straight into the world of work at 16, you have two basic options. The standard academic choice is to do A-levels, which can help get you into university. But you can also choose to learn while you work, which means you can earn money while you train.

A-levels

A-levels are the normal academic British qualifications which British people do after GCSEs and are the normal route to follow if you intend to go on to university. Most students will do three A-levels, and their place at university depends on the results of these.

Some high-schools provide the facility to do A-levels after finishing your GCSEs (in ‘Year 11’). However, if this is not the case, you will have to go to a further education college to continue learning. These are often called ‘sixth-form colleges’ because Year 11 used to be known as the ‘fifth form’ of high-school.

There is much more choice available to you at this stage than before, because a wider variety of courses are available at A-level. But you should choose which courses you want to do carefully, because A-levels will determine what courses you can do at university, or what sort of job you go into. Often you can choose to do something new, because many courses do not require you to have any previous experience.

Where to go

If you are looking for somewhere to study A-levels, you can go to a school sixth form, a sixth form college, a further education college, or a specialist college. For information on colleges see our "Find a..." section.

If you go to a school sixth-form it is usually more disciplined, and you may also have to wear a uniform. Whereas, at colleges, you can wear what you like and there is usually a more relaxed adult atmosphere.

So that you make the best decision for yourself, it is best to get prospectuses for all the sixth-forms and colleges in your area so you can find out about all about their facilities before making a choice.

Learning while you work

More and more employers and employees are seeing the benefit of training while working on the job. The employee gets a job which pays, and gets training which qualifies him – which means more security for the future. Meanwhile the employer gets a worker they know is learning the right skills, and is guaranteed to stay with the company for a certain amount of time.

In some cases the employer and employee will actually agree a set period of time which the employee will have to stay with the company after doing the training. This sort of training at work can take the form of a ‘day-release’, where you are allowed to go to college for one day of the week, in which case, this would be advertised as part of the job description.

However, an easy way to access on-the-job training is through a modern apprenticeship. In the past, these were just for learning a ‘trade’ such as brick-laying, or plumbing, but now there are apprenticeships for all sorts of professional careers such as accountancy and administration.

If you are sure of the career you want to follow, this may be the right option for you, as it gives you the training you need, at the same time as guaranteeing you a job.

You can find out more about apprenticeships by visiting our “Find a…” section.

By Matt Taylor

USEFUL WORDS

FE = Further Education
Post-Secondary / Post-Compulsory / Post-16 / Sixth-Form College = all examples of FE
skills-based vocational education = connected with the skills you need in order to do a particular job

Examples of FE qualifications:

Higher National Diploma (HND)
Higher National Certificate (HNC)
Business & Technical Education Council National Diploma (BTEC)
Foundation Degree = a course you take which prepares you for a full university degree
lecturers = teachers at an FE college
students

GRAMMAR SPOT

Suffixes

-er : the person who does an activity (e.g. writer, worker, shopper, teacher)
-er/-or : things which do a particular job (e.g. projector, bottle-opener, grater)
-er/-ee : the person who does something / receives or experiences the action (e.g. employer/employee, sender/addressee)
-(t)ion : used to make nouns from verbs (e.g. complication, pollution, reduction)
-ist/-ism : used for people's politics, beliefs and ideologies and sometimes professions (e.g. Marxism, Buddhism, journalism, terrorist)
-ist : used for people who play musical instruments (e.g. pianist, violinist, cellist)
-ness : used to make nouns from adjectives (e.g. readiness, forgetfulness, happiness, sadness)
-able/-ible : with verbs means 'can be done' (e.g. drinkable, washable, recognisable)
-ise : makes verbs from adjectives (e.g. modernise, commercialise, industrialise)

Prefixes

anti- : against (e.g. anti-war, antibiotic)
auto- : of or by oneself (e.g. autograph, auto-pilot)
bi- : two, twice (e.g. bicycle, bilingual)
ex- : former / out of (e.g. ex-wife, ex-president, extract, exhale)
micro- : small (e.g. microwave, microscopic)
mis- : badly / wrongly (e.g. misunderstand, misinform)
mono- : one / single (e.g. monotonous, monologue)
multi- : many (e.g. multi-national, multi-purpose)
over- : too much (e.g. overdo, oversleep)
post- : after (e.g. postwar, postgraduate)
pro- : in favour of (e.g. pro-government, pro-revolutionary)
pseudo- : false (e.g. pseudo-scientific, pseudo-intellectual)
re- : again / back (e.g. retype, replace)
semi- : half (e.g. semicircular, semi-detached)
sub- : under (e.g. subway, submarine)
under- : not enough (e.g. underworked, undercooked)