On this page, you will find some recommendations on what to watch, read, listen and do to engage with your subject. As well as feeding your intellectual curiosity, these links may provide useful material for your UCAS statement. Once you have engaged with the links, make sure that you practise putting your thoughts into words with the writing activity at the end.
Watch
Why Businesses Can be Good at Solving Social Problems
What All Great Leaders Have in Common
How to Build a Business That Lasts 100 Years
Read
Why Silicon Valley Can’t Fix Itself
How Netflix Recruits Stunning Colleagues
Listen
The Secret Life of a CEO – Jack Welch
Business School or School of Life?
Marketing: Hacking the Unconscious
Do
- Find work experience – It can be hard to find a great work experience placement but it is worth it. There are lots of schemes that offer work experience for Year 12s – you can find an example list here. If you can’t find a scheme with a major employer, you can still find work experience in your local community, especially if you can explain your interest in studying business further.
- Find a mentor working in business – It can be valuable to find a mentor working in business to help you find out more about professional life and how businesses run. As an added bonus, they may also be able to help you think about your next steps around university and employment. As with work experience, there are lots of schemes to help connect school students with mentors, such as Career Ready. Again, if you can’t find a scheme, there will be mentors in your local community.
- Create your own startup – While this won’t be for everyone, one of the best ways of gaining business experience is to start your own. Whether it succeeds or fails, you will certainly have some interesting insights for your UCAS application. You could offer something simple like babysitting or tutoring, but you could also develop products or services. Here is a list of teen entrepreneurs for inspiration!
Write
To apply to university, you need to demonstrate that you are well informed about the subject and have a strong interest in studying it at greater depth. To get started, practice writing about your subject interests by composing short responses to the following questions:
- What have you watched, read or listened to that has inspired you?
- Why was it interesting?
- What new issues did you learn about?
- What do you want to find out next?
- What excites you about the subject?
- Why do you think studying the subject is important?