Today, Futures Fortnight 2024 draws to a close following a jam-packed two weeks of future focused lessons and events where every pupil at Oswestry School has been encouraged to consider what options are open to them in the future. 

In the Prep School, the Futures Carousel was once again a highlight where parents in a range of careers generously gave up their time to talk to pupils about their careers and how they got there. This year saw talks from parents industries ranging from IT and media to health and charity work. Pupils thoroughly enjoyed listening to the guest speakers and no doubt learned a lot. 

In the Senior School the Fortnight was launched with two seminars which explored a future with the army and an introduction to apprenticeships. For pupils who wanted to hear about alternative routes into various careers, both these talks showed them that university is not the only option for pupils into various careers. 

This year also saw the introduction of our Futures Symposiums. These symposiums were themed events focused on providing pupils the opportunity to speak to a variety of different people who work in a particular sector of employment. Across the fortnight, we have seen 185 pupils speak to 35 different speakers, from 14 different industries. The fascinating stories about what our speakers do on a day to day basis along with the various ways they got to their chosen career engaged pupils and gave them plenty to think about for their own career journeys. 

Our annual Futures Fair was another huge success with over 40 exhibitors in attendance allowing pupils to explore even more career opportunities along with various university and apprenticeship options. 

A highlight of the fortnight for our First and Second Form was our British Airways Challenge which was delivered by The Inspirational Learning Group. Pupils spent the day in teams and had to explore the exciting world of International Travel and create a new subsidiary airline for British Airways that sits alongside their CityFlyer and EuroFlyer brands. Pupils had to consider who would use their airline, where it would fly and how they would ensure a quality service for their target customer, whilst keeping their airline sustainable and commercially viable. All teams came up with very innovative ideas but our eventual winning team designed the unique concept of 'Agriair' which was targeted at people travelling in the agricultural industry. Well done team Agriair! 

If these events weren't enough, all pupils had the chance to engage with a 'have a go' sports commentary session,  future focused lessons as well as house activities designed to develop our school values and virtues. All in all, this year's Futures Fortnight has been bigger and better than ever before and will have hopefully allowed all pupils no matter what their age, to realise what they can do beyond school.