What is Trident?
Trident is a work experience scheme that all Jersey secondary schools participate in. It provides a unique opportunity for students to experience working life while still at school.
Each year over 400 companies and organisations provide work experience placements of 2 or 3 weeks to around 1000 14 – 16 year olds from the Island's schools. Students come from the full range of abilities with a success rate of 97%. Trident, now in its 35th year on Jersey, works with many employers who have been engaged since its inception.
How do businesses benefit?
We regularly hear from employers that the following skills are highly valued:
- good attitude to work
- honesty
- reliability
- problem solving
- communication
- team work
The Trident work experience scheme is a fantastic opportunity for students, tomorrow’s workforce, to develop these skills. Additionally, the scheme allows:
- your organisation to become known by teachers, students and parents
- puts you in touch with the future workforce, with the potential for employing students during school holidays if they prove an asset to your organisation
- your organisation to gain a new, young perspective of your work
- your staff to act as mentors to the students and gain supervisory skills
If I agree to offer a work experience placement for Trident, how many students do I have to take each year?
We could ask you for a maximum of 5 students each year as we have 5 placement periods, however it would be entirely up to you how many students you feel your business could cope with. The 5 placement periods are:
- early spring (February)
- spring (March)
- whitsun (May)
- summer (June / July)
- autumn (October).
Do I have to pay the students?
Trident is not a paid scheme – either for you or the students. If you wish to say ‘thank you’ to a student who has worked particularly hard we have some recommendations, being a maximum of £30 for a 2 week placement or £50 for a 3 week placement, but this is entirely down to you and many of our employers do not give the students any financial reward.
What paperwork is involved?
Trident tries to keep paperwork to a minimum, but with any placement involving young people there is a small amount of paper to process. When you initially sign up to Trident, someone from the Trident office will visit you to go through the scheme and ask you to sign a 'letter of understanding' which sets out the aims and boundaries of work experience.
They will also take a copy of your employer and public liability insurance and check that you have a valid health and safety policy in place if legally required. An update visit will be arranged by Trident depending on the risk factor of the job offered. For example, high risk jobs require an annual visit, while low risk jobs require a visit once every 4 years.
Trident will send you contact information for each student that you agree to take on approximately 3 weeks before the placement begins. This will include a basic health and safety induction sheet to be completed with the student on their first day of work. The student will receive their paperwork shortly after you receive their details and will contact you for an ‘interview’. They will bring with them a ‘blue’ agreement form which the student, their parent and yourself will need to sign. The student will return this to their school.
During the second or third week a teacher will arrange to meet for a short visit with you and the student. At this meeting they will collect the green induction form and leave you with a ‘yellow’ employer reference form and pre-paid envelope. This should be completed once the placement has finished and posted back to Trident. Examples of all Trident paperwork can be obtained from the Trident office.
Can I choose which students to take?
All students are asked to select 6 opportunities or jobs from a database of over 500, along with an explanation of why they have made their selections. They are also asked to provide their predicted GCSE grades and tell us about any health issues. Their form tutors will give each student a score for their social skills such as maturity, outgoing personality, reliability etc.
Once Trident receive the completed form, they will allocate 1 student who they feel is most suitable for the role at your organisation for each placement period. Trident then write to you to request a placement for this student giving you the dates of the placement. There is a tick sheet form attached to this which should be returned to Trident to let us know if you can accommodate the student. We shall give you information on any medical or potential behavioural issues when we make the initial request.
What sort of work can I give the student?
Our students are generally enthusiastic but unskilled and as such tend to take on entry level tasks. Each placement has a job description attached to it and specific tasks and hours of work would be discussed during the initial Trident visit.
What happens if things go wrong and the student causes problems for my staff or clients?
We promise all of our employers that if they have a student who is rude, late, badly behaved, uninterested or continually absent, that we will remove them from the placement immediately and they will return to school. All schools are prepared for this eventuality and will take students back without question. Students are also made aware of this before they go out on placement.
How do I go about offering Trident work experience placements?
Contact the Trident office by phone or email (see contacts on the right hand side of this page).
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