Thinking Geographically: Making Connections Between School Geography and Future Careers in the United Kingdom

This chapter describes the United Kingdom contribution to an international project which aims to better connect school geography with future careers in geography-related professions. We first provide a summary of student interests and career aspirations collected via an online survey (n = 128), before identifying a professional who uses geography knowledge and skills in their work. As survey data indicated that geography students were concerned about the environment and sustainability and were interested in associated jobs such as those in the renewable energy sector, the professional we selected was the Head of Onshore Wind and Solar Development (Wales and England) at a multi-national company. During interview, the professional provided their education background, role and responsibilities and discussed aspects of the geography knowledge, skills, data, perspectives, and technology used in their work. Drawing on this information, a career-orientated school geography lesson was developed and is outlined here. The chapter concludes with a discussion of why it is important to make links between professional and school geographers and how career-orientated lessons can support students to make informed decisions about future career paths.