Event report - Linking London IAG Practitioner Group Meeting

After a warm welcome from Andrew Jones, Director at Linking London, the meeting began with a presentation from Chris Webb, podcaster, writer and Careers Consultant at the University of Huddersfield who outlined the rapidly changing careers, skills, and education policy environment, highlighting increased fragmentation across government departments, new funding and structural reforms (including the new Jobs and Careers Service), and the growing influence of AI, lifelong learning, and work experience policy on careers guidance delivery.

This was followed by a presentation from Chris Rea, Head of strategic relationships - Prospects, Luminate and Hedd gave an overview of the Graduate Labour Market including recruiter perspectives, challenging negative media narratives about a “graduate jobs crisis,” demonstrating that the graduate labour market remains resilient, while exploring how AI is affecting student perceptions, recruitment processes and application volumes.

After a short comfort break, we then got into groups to discuss supporting learners transition on to higher level learning: Challenges, Opportunities and Areas for Collaboration.

Lastly attendees heard from Ben Rutter, Student Loans Company who presented on the latest HE finance news and updates, covering income contingent student loans and repayment plans, stressed the importance of early applications and DSA awareness, and explained current and forthcoming changes to student finance, including early guidance on the Lifelong Learning Entitlement and how repayments are linked to income, not debt size.

The next IAG Practitioner Group meeting will take place on the 11 June 2026, 10:00 — 11:30am