Post-16 Transitions: a Longitudinal Study of Young People with ...

were choices but young person and family had to identify these
choices for themselves with greater or lesser degrees of support
from professionals. In other cases, planning and choosing were
undertaken, but there was inadequate preparation by the receiving
provider. Some young people found schools or Careers/Connexions
workers unsympathetic to their own view of their futures. In other
cases, relationship with the school had broken down, there was no
effective planning and preparation and they were cast back on
their own resources.
4.6 Perceptions/experience of school
Most of the young people interviewed during the Wave 2
survey seemed to have a positive regard for their time at
school. Young people were asked whether they agreed or
disagreed with a number of statements about their school
experience and the results are presented in Figure 4.4.
Over half of all young people responding to these questions
agreed that:
• school had given them the confidence to make decisions
• school had taught them things that would be useful in a job
• school work was generally worth doing.
Figure 4:4: Young person’s views on school experience
More disappointingly though, less than half of all young
people agreed that school had helped them to decide what to
do next, or indeed that it had helped them to decide what they
School helped give me confidence to make decisions
School did little to prepare me for life when I left/leave
School has taught me things that would be useful in a job
School work is generally worth doing
School helped me to decide what I wanted to do next
School helped me to decide what I wanted to be doing in five
years time
I found it hard to make friends at school
I got a lot of support from my friends at school
The teachers at school did not understand my needs
N = 1,874
0% 10% 20% 30% 40% 50% 60% 70% 80% 90% 100%
Agree Neither agree nor disagree Disagree
Source: IES/MORI 2003
Post-16 Transitions of Young People with SEN: Wave 2 49