Students generally undertake work experience in Year 9 or 10 (or both), for around a week at a time

You can complete it in term or in the holidays, your school will know about it, and your ‘employer’ will be asked to report back on how you performed, and if you participated.

Work experience is an opportunity

That means that other people are doing something for your benefit, without asking for anything in return. Once you leave school opportunities like this become more difficult to find, so we always recommend that students should take advantage of work experience.

You won’t be paid for your time

And that’s because generally any work you may perform needs to be supervised and checked. Plus, your ‘employer’ will have invested time and energy into creating an experience solely for your benefit, without expecting anything in return.

You can do work experience as part of your school’s program, or you can source your own work experience

As the job market gets more competitive work experience is becoming the norm for job applicants, and many tertiary students undertake work experience as part of their qualification. So if you’ve missed your school’s program, or the work experience you’ve already done didn’t answer your questions, then see if you can organise some more.

There are thousands of opportunities across a huge range of industries

But you’ll learn more if you try a job you are seriously considering, rather than choosing the ‘fun’ option. Put simply, if you don’t really want to work with animals then don’t apply to do work experience at the zoo.