Welcome to WEXA - The Leicester and Leicestershire Work Experience Alliance

Who are we?

• block student placements (one, two, three week duration)
• bespoke placements for particular student target groups
• extended placements
• curriculum development

What do we do?

WEXA arranges placements for about 8000 Leicester and Leicestershire students each year.  The Alliance works with schools and colleges across the city and county to place students, giving them appropriate experiences that allow them to achieve a range of learning outcomes.
We offer a range of services including:

Employer visits/vetting

On behalf of all Leicester and Leicestershire schools, WEXA works with the LEBC who offers a streamlined and effective approach to the employer visit, an essential requirement before any student goes out on work experience.  Vetting is undertaken by experienced and appropriately qualified employer assessors. The essential function of employer visits is to ensure that work experience will give the student a safe, secure placement with appropriate supervision and relevant learning outcomes.

Arranging placements

On behalf of all city and some county schools and colleges, WEXA arranges placements. The placement service meets the needs of centres requiring:

• Block placements, typically for whole year groups or large elements of a cohort
• Bespoke placements for part year groups or for learners with particular curricular interest
  (eg. requiring a placement linked to a vocational course) such as BTECs, Diplomas etc
• Extended placements – for learners on curriculum programmes requiring placements for blocks of time (more than one or two weeks) or for one/two days per week across all, or part, of a year.

Curriculum Development

WEXA is also involved in curriculum development, including:

• Research into learner need
• Responding to the challenges of the changing 14-19 education and training scene
• Seeking to develop work experience as an increasingly integral part of the young person's learning experience (eg. through the development of placements linked to GCSEs /Diplomas in Vocational areas )
• Helping schools and colleges to meet the statutory requirement for Work Related Learning (WRL) at Key Stage 4 (first introduced in September 2004)

Responding to needs

WEXA is constantly seeking to develop employer/placement capacity in order to meet the growing and changing need for work experience placements.