Year 12 Work Experience: How to Find a Placement and Use It in Your Application

Year 12 work experience is time spent in a workplace during the first year of sixth form, through a placement, a day of shadowing, an employer's insight programme, volunteering or a part-time job. Placements often fall in the summer term or the summer holiday before Year 13, and some schools run a work experience week for the whole year group.

No national rule sets how many days a Year 12 student should do. Work experience helps a student test a career before choosing a degree, and for medicine, dentistry and veterinary science it is part of what admissions tutors look for.

When does Year 12 work experience usually happen and how long does it last?

Placements are usually arranged for the summer term of Year 12 or the summer holiday before Year 13, so that they do not clash with teaching or exams. Length depends on the route: employer insight programmes often run for a few days, such as Aon's three-day Work Insights Programme, while the length of a placement arranged directly with an employer is agreed between the student, the school and the host.

Some schools and colleges set aside a fixed work experience week for the whole year group, in which case the school arranges the dates and often the placement itself. Where a student arranges their own placement independently, the timing is a matter of agreement between the student, the school and the host employer, and should avoid clashing with timetabled teaching, exams or coursework deadlines.

What are the main routes into Year 12 work experience?

A Year 12 student can reach work experience through several routes, and many students combine more than one.

• School or college arranged placements: the school's careers team sources or approves an employer placement, usually during a set work experience week, and handles the paperwork and risk assessment.
• Employer-run Year 12 programmes and insight weeks: some employers advertise structured programmes for sixth formers on their own careers pages. Aon's Work Insights Programme, for example, is a three-day in-person programme for Year 12 and 13 students at state-funded schools or colleges, with panel discussions on career pathways in professional and financial services.
• Virtual work experience: some companies offer placements completed remotely, and UCAS runs its own virtual work experiences, which suit students who cannot travel to a workplace.
• Volunteering: regular unpaid work for a charity, community group or not-for-profit organisation, valuable both in its own right and as evidence of sustained involvement with a cause or sector.
• Shadowing: following a professional through their working day to observe without carrying out tasks, useful where a full placement is hard to arrange, including in regulated settings such as healthcare.
• Part-time jobs: paid employment outside school hours, which counts as workplace experience even where it has no direct link to a future course or career, since it demonstrates reliability, teamwork and time management.

How do you find and apply for a Year 12 work experience placement?

A Year 12 student typically starts by asking their school's careers leader or careers adviser what is already arranged or available through the school's employer contacts, since many schools hold existing relationships that make securing a placement more straightforward. Where a student wants to arrange something independently, useful starting points include family and friends' networks, local employers connected to a subject of interest, and any employer-run Year 12 programmes advertised on the employer's own careers pages.

UCAS advises writing to a named contact at the organisation, found on its website or by phoning, and sending a brief CV and covering letter that states clearly when the student is available and what they want, whether that is a placement, shadowing or voluntary work. A short, specific request is easier for a busy employer to say yes to.

Persistence helps. The Royal College of Veterinary Surgeons tells aspiring vets that good work experience takes time and effort, that it is fine to start small, for example by volunteering at an animal charity, and that basic animal care roles are a way to prove reliability before moving on to other placements.

What does the Department for Education say schools should provide?

The Department for Education's statutory careers guidance adopts the Gatsby Benchmarks. Benchmark 5 covers encounters with employers and employees, and Benchmark 6 covers experiences of workplaces: by the age of 16 every pupil should have had meaningful experiences of workplaces, and by 18 at least one further meaningful experience. In colleges, every learner should have at least one meaningful experience of a workplace during their programme of study, in addition to any part-time job.

For a sixth former, that means the school should offer at least one further workplace experience before the student leaves. The careers leader is the first contact for what the school will arrange and for how a placement the student finds independently fits the school's programme.

Which university courses expect relevant work experience, and what counts?

Medicine, dentistry and veterinary science are the courses where relevant experience is most clearly expected, and courses leading to work with children or vulnerable adults, such as teaching, nursing and social work, often ask applicants to show they understand the role. Each university sets its own expectations on its course pages, so check those before planning placements around them.

For medicine, the Medical Schools Council lists two kinds of relevant experience: caring or service roles, such as volunteering or working with people, and observing healthcare, in person or online. Experience in a clinical setting is not required: retail, hospitality and community volunteering all count, paid and unpaid roles are both valid, and the focus is on what the student learns and how they reflect on it.

For dentistry, the Dental Schools Council publishes work experience guidance for applicants, and each dental school states its own expectations on its course pages, so read both before arranging time in a dental practice.

For veterinary science, the RCVS advises starting as early as possible, using weekends and school holidays, and building up from small roles such as volunteering at an animal charity. It notes that some practices have age restrictions for insurance reasons, so younger students may need to begin with animal charities or observational visits, and it recommends keeping detailed records of every experience.

How do you reflect on a placement and use it in a UCAS personal statement or at interview?

Reflection means explaining what a placement showed the student about the work, the people and the course they want to study. UCAS suggests questions to answer: what the student found particularly interesting or inspiring, what it says about the profession, and whether it was challenging. Notes made during the placement make those answers easier to write weeks later.

In the personal statement, a small number of experiences explored in depth works better than a list: what the student noticed, what surprised them, and how it changed or confirmed their understanding of the course or career.

At interview, the same material supports specific, concrete answers instead of general statements of interest. A student who can describe a particular incident from a placement and what they took from it gives an interviewer something to ask follow-up questions about, which a vague reference to "doing work experience" does not.

What should a student do if a placement falls through?

A student whose placement is cancelled should tell the school's careers leader straight away, since the school may know other employers who can help at short notice. Virtual work experience, a short period of shadowing or a volunteering commitment can take its place.

The personal statement can still draw on experience the student already has, including part-time work, volunteering or an earlier placement, since admissions tutors read for understanding and reflection.

Related guides

• What are super-curricular activities?
• UCAS personal statement: the three questions
• Super-curricular activities for medicine
• University application support

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