ICEGS: 25th Anniversary

2023 - 25th Anniversary of International Centre for Guidance Studies

Last year marked our 25th year as a research centre. If you cast your mind back to 1998, it was the year of the Northern Ireland Peace Agreement, Tony Blair was an exciting new Prime Minister, Titanic was the blockbuster dominating the cinemas and Britney Spears was asking her baby to hit her one more time. Perhaps even more importantly, career guidance was still being provided to young people by the careers service, and the IAG partnerships were emerging to co-ordinate adult guidance.

On the 8th December 1998, Tony Watts stood up at the University of Derby and gave the inaugural lecture Reshaping Career Development for the 21st Century, which launched the Centre for Guidance Studies (we added international after our 10th anniversary in recognition of how our work was evolving). Over the subsequent 25 years the career guidance landscape in the UK and overseas has been through enormous changes. Some of the big changes for career guidance have been driven by big political changes. Devolution, change of government, the 2008 banking crisis, Michael Gove’s stint as Secretary of State for Education and Brexit have all left their marks on the career guidance sector. But, so too have more specific career guidance policies such as the creation and then dissolution of Connexions, the formation of the National Careers Service, Skills Development Scotland, Careers Wales and the Careers & Enterprise Company, the emergence of the Gatsby Benchmarks and many more initiatives. iCeGS, it seems, has been cursed to live in 'interesting times.' 

Moore, N., Staunton, T., Hooley, T., Vahidi, G., Lai, K., Blake, H., Rose, P. and Neary, S. (2023). International Centre for Guidance Studies (iCeGS) Annual Review 2023 - 25th Anniversary. University of Derby. https://doi.org/10.48773/q3vq8 

iCeGS 25th Anniversary in images

A Few Words From Our Supporters

Thank you:

• David Morgan - Chief Executive Career Development Institute (CDI)
• Julie Blant - Head of Business School Postgraduate Careers University of Nottingham
• David Andrew - Emeritus Visiting Fellow of Career Education and Guidance
• Dr Gill Frigerio - Associate Professor, University of Warwick Chair, NICEC (National Institute for Career Education and Counselling)
• Ray Plummer - Associate Academic Tutor Former Civil Servant for the National Careers Service

Professor Tony Watts iCeGS 17th Annual Lecture

Professor Tony Watts delivering the International Centre for Guidance Studies (iCeGS) 17th Annual Lecture, November 2014. Career development: looking back; moving forward.