I want children to be ambitious about their futures as well as about their present. I want them to have the support they need to become successful adults, including helping them to get good jobs and careers that fulfil their goals.
I want to adopt a cradle to career approach to education with a stronger focus on vocational routes, such as apprenticeships and better careers education. By bringing schools and workplaces closer together, we can help children achieve that ambition of a good job or career when they grow up.
If people actually had more opportunity and more choice, maybe they would be choosing the right path and actually find fulfilment within life.
Girl, 17,
The Big Ask
Read The Children’s Plan: The Children’s Commissioner’s School Census in full. Read the Summary version. For the first time as Children’s Commissioner, I have used my statutory powers to ask all schools, and colleges, a set of questions. A census in response to what children told me they wanted and needed to attend, engage, attain, […]
This report should not have to exist. Shining a light on children’s experiences of poverty in 2025, in one of the wealthiest countries in the world, should not be necessary. And yet, the findings in this work highlight real hardship; an almost-Dickensian level of poverty facing some children in England today. After four years as […]
The year ahead – 2025-26 – will be my penultimate year as Children’s Commissioner for England. It will also mark 20 years since the establishment of this office – a milestone that offers an opportunity to reflect on the progress we have made and a reminder about the many urgent challenges that remain. More than […]
I’ve designed a version of my Business Plan aimed specifically for children and young people, sharing the projects and themes that my office will be working on. As Children’s Commissioner for England, it is my job to listen to you and take your voices to decision makers. In my survey, The Big Ambition, only one […]
The Children’s Commissioner’s Care Experienced Advisory Board have created a hierarchy of needs based on Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs. It is a visual guide to help professionals working with care experienced young people understand their needs and support them. The different levels of the pyramid consider the basic requirements that care experienced young people need […]
As Children’s Commissioner one of my main ambitions is that every child has access to a brilliant education: one that helps them to achieve their goals, no matter how ambitious. To make this possible they need access to a broad range of subjects, with a particular focus on the core subjects of English, maths and […]
As Children’s Commissioner, I have had the privilege to hear from many brilliant and inspiring care experienced young people about their lives now and hopes for the future. Care experienced young people are rightly ambitious for their futures and have told me what support they need to help them meet their own goals. To help […]
As Children’s Commissioner, I have visited hundreds of children from across the country and spoken to them about their hopes, dreams, and aspirations. While many children talk to me about how to improve childhood, they also talk about their visions for the future. Through these conversations, I have seen the sheer scale of ambition this […]
As Children’s Commissioner it is my job to promote and protect the rights of children, and to make sure their voices are heard. That’s why in September 2023, I launched The Big Ambition to hear directly from children, young people, and parents across the country. I wanted to hear about what they wanted for the […]
I’ve developed ‘Where can I go with maths?’, an interactive quiz for children featuring over 50 career profiles of role models using maths or maths skills in their work. It has been developed to show connections and transferable skills between the KS3 maths curriculum, careers, and everyday life.
My office is running a data challenge for children using real data from The Big Ask that was launched in Maths Week in November 2022. It is an opportunity for young people to hear what other young people told me about their wellbeing and future priorities. Submissions are open!
I laid out some of my ambitions for the future of jobs and skills at a Conservative Party Conference event, sponsored by Onward and the Centre for Social Justice.  
I have talked to care experienced apprentices from Warwickshire Council, to primary children getting their first careers conversations through Primary Futures, and visited young people at Open Road, an FE college in Norfolk, specialising in helping young people at risk of exclusion learn practical, vocational skills. My team continue to engage stakeholders working in youth employment and careers. 
In the Children’s Advisory Board and Care Experienced Advisory Board we will be running training and skills sessions and offering mentoring and career opportunities to participants to help equip them for their futures.
