Students take part in Young Persons’ Programme at Scarborough Hospital

Students from schools and colleges across Scarborough have spent a week at Scarborough Hospital gaining invaluable insight into the NHS.

The hospital’s annual Corporate Young Persons’ Programme, which ran from 4-8 June, gave 18 year 10 students from local schools, and a further two from Scarborough 6th Form College, the chance to sample some of the many careers on offer and learn more about life in a busy acute hospital. 

The highlights of the week included a basic resus session where the young people got the opportunity to learn CPR, a ‘wash and glow’ session from the Infection Prevention team which identifies poor hygiene practice, and an insight from the sterile services team, who clean, disinfect and sterilise reusable surgical instruments - making them safe for further use.

Mandy McClymont, NVQ Assessor/Verifier, Support Staff Learning Team at the hospital, explained more: “Taking part in the Young Persons’ Programme can help students learn more about a desired career, and provide valuable information and practical experience.  It can also help students develop aspirations for career options in a hospital that they had not previously considered.

“Co-ordinating the week is a lot of hard work, which would not have been possible without the support of many other members of staff working across the Trust.  The feedback we have received from the students has been overwhelmingly positive and has made the week’s activities more than worthwhile.  The young people were a credit to themselves, as well as the schools they represented.”

Rachel Wilkinson, aged 15, said:  “It’s been a brilliant week, full of amazing opportunities, and definitely worth it.  It’s given me a great insight into the working world of the NHS, which has helped me find out for myself what I might want to do when I leave school.

“I have visited the hospital before but always as a patient, so it’s been really interesting to find out what a hospital is like behind the scenes.  I didn’t realise there are so many roles available.

“My favourite part of the week was the question and answer session with junior doctors who have just left university and the diabetes session where we learned about insulin and sugar levels.”

Shannon Fletcher, aged 15, added:  “Visiting the hospital for a week has really given me an insight into all the different jobs there are.  When you think about a career in a hospital you think it’s just for doctors and nurses, but that’s not true.  There are many more jobs within the hospital than you realise, even within a small team.

“I want to work in paediatrics when I’m older, so I really enjoyed the child health aspect of the week when we visited the Children’s Ward and met the nursing team.”

Anne Devaney, Deputy Director - Learning and Organisational Development at York Teaching Hospital NHS Foundation Trust added: “The programme is about providing an opportunity for local youngsters to discover what roles are available within the NHS, in addition to medicine and nursing.  This understanding will hopefully assist them in choosing a career in healthcare via practice placements or an apprenticeship scheme.

“It has been an inspiring week for all involved and heartening to see so many young people excited at the opportunity of seeing what our amazing staff do.  Hopefully many of the students will want to come and work for us when they leave school so that we can continue to recruit locally and build a workforce that will grow with the organisation.”

11 June 2018