At the recent “into the Workplace” event held at Alton Community Centre, Alton Chamber invited John Cunningham of Young Chamber to demonstrate their “5th Matrix” online system. This is designed to encourage school-age children to have career aspirations, and to allow them to research their chosen career interests. Up until now, this system has only been operated through schools, but especially for us, John set up an account for the Chamber to run our own scheme.
So what is it all about? The idea is that people register with their school, or in this case, Alton Chamber, and they can then search the Internet for information about jobs and careers. Unlike the open Internet, they are then able to copy information into folders that they can refer back to when they log on at a later date. For instance, let’s say that a student is interested in aeroplanes. They can create a folder called “Aeroplanes” and find information on the Internet and save it into that folder. As they search, they are bound to find out that the aerospace industry is vast and very diverse, with many different types of job involved. Their research might lead them to create a folder called “Aero Engineer” and another called “metallurgist”. They are able to share information with others in their class through a Blog and this is where the school comes in as moderator. Some choose to limit the use of the system to particular times of a school’s timetable, whilst others let their children use the system from home.
The beauty of the idea is that it is portable. It is a “cloud” system, so a registered user can use any online computer to access their folders. Also, as they get older, they can continue to use it once they move to a new school. In actual fact, there’s no reason why a person couldn’t use it as an adult and I would encourage the designers to widen their scope. There is a commercial element. It is possible for local companies to advertise jobs and/or to include links to their website. This means that large companies might consider the system as a means of preparing potential employees before they are of the right age to be employed. Thus, having a sponsored link to a company website may not directly provide employees, it is investing in your future workforce. Of course, you are able to advertise actual jobs as well. There is a small charge for these services.
If you would like to know more, you can contact us or see the 5th Matrix page of the Young Chamber website: www.youngchamber.com/5th-matrix
