Dear fellow students:

    When you leave your country to go to a boarding school in England, you have an ultimate goal in your mind. At least your parents have this goal clearly set in their minds, in the hope that you prepare a solid grounding to progress to a good university and a career you will excel at. Therefore, try to pave the way for life beyond high school, starting as early as Year 10.

    I have found that good private boarding schools here do have very good career guidance programs for students. Further tertiary education is by far the most popular route for a career path.

    Starting as early as the end of Year 9, good private boarding schools prepare teenage students far beyond what is necessary to attend college. There are abundant opportunities to sample the adult working world, which may be offered by the school or similar programs.

    I must mention the Young Enterprise program that I recently took part in. It is a popular course offered at many private boarding schools. Young Enterprise is a business project set up and run by a group of students.

    Students aim to make a profit as the final goal, while learning a great deal along the way. It is an example of a real business entity and is supported by the school to give students the practical experience of running a business.

    Throughout the course of two terms, participating students spend their time and effort to run the company by promoting a product or service to the school or local community. I truly enjoyed being in the position of Purchasing Director for this project, and have acquired quite a lot of interpersonal, communication and teamwork skills.

    What is great about Young Enterprise is that even if you are not a business-oriented person, you can explore your creativity or organization skills to help promote the company. It is an interesting project that allows you to experience a real taste of the world outside high school.

    Our school also supports any creative ideas that students may put forward. For example, I ran a project designing and selling pyjama bottoms with the school logo embroidered on them and purchased the pyjama bottoms in China to sell at school. The profit was donated to a charity organization I chose with the help of the headmistress.

    In this process, I learned how the business process worked, including the process of designing, marketing, sales and how the concept of profit and loss works.

    I have also found that there is a very good culture in the United Kingdom providing opportunities for newcomers. It is not difficult to find short-term summer jobs and it is much easier to find work in the United Kingdom compared with China. Make the best of the United Kingdom’s great company culture and any career tasting sessions.

    Yours fondly,

    Susan M B Chen

    Year 13 student at Downe House School