Careers Lead Guide
You're the engine of careers education at your school. Chapter gives you everything you need to plan, deliver, and evidence a world-class programme — from Gatsby Benchmark tracking to one-click parent digests.
Overview
As Careers Lead, you have full access to every feature in Chapter. Your dashboard shows a live view of your school's Gatsby Benchmark scores, recent activity, and students who need attention. Everything you log — events, sessions, lessons — updates your benchmarks automatically.
Your role in Chapter
Careers Leads can manage students, events, guidance sessions, lessons, providers, reports, and settings. You can also invite other staff and manage the parent digest. Teachers and parents only see what is relevant to them.
Getting started
Follow these five steps to get your school set up and your first term underway.
- 1
Set up your school profile
Go to Settings → School and add your school name, URN, phase, and contact details. This information powers your Ofsted-ready reports.
- 2
Import your students
Navigate to Students → Import and upload a CSV export from your MIS (SIMS, Bromcom, etc.), or add students manually. Year groups are auto-detected.
- 3
Create your first event
Go to Events → New Event. Set a title, date, provider, and student groups. Chapter generates a unique self-registration link for your provider.
- 4
Book guidance sessions
Head to Sessions → New Session. Assign a student, set a date and session type. Completed sessions auto-log against Gatsby Benchmark 8.
- 5
Check your Gatsby scores
Open Reports → Gatsby. Your live benchmark scores update every time you log an activity. Use the Gaps view to prioritise what needs attention.
Students
Student Management
A complete view of every student's careers journey — their Gatsby score, event history, guidance sessions, and work experience.
- Search and filter by year group, cohort, or Gatsby score
- Click any student to view their full activity timeline
- Flag students who need a guidance session booking
- Bulk-import from CSV or connect your MIS for auto-sync
Use cohorts for bulk actions
Create cohorts (e.g. “Post-16 Applicants”, “SEND Students”) under the Cohorts page to quickly filter, report on, and bulk-assign students to events.
Events & Providers
Events & Providers
Plan and manage careers events from initial idea to post-event reporting. Providers can self-register attendance, saving you hours of admin.
- Create events with date, location, linked provider, and student groups
- Share a unique link with the provider so they mark their own attendance
- Post-event, Chapter updates Gatsby scores automatically
- Manage your provider network under People → Providers
Guidance Sessions
Guidance Sessions
Schedule, run, and evidence 1:1 careers guidance. Every completed session is logged against the student and auto-mapped to Gatsby Benchmark 8.
- Book sessions directly from a student's profile
- Record session type, outcomes, and agreed next steps
- Chapter AI can draft outcome notes to save you time
- Sessions appear in the student's timeline and the Gatsby report instantly
Gatsby Benchmark 8 requirement
The DfE requires that every student receives at least one personal guidance session before leaving school. Chapter tracks this automatically and flags students who haven't had one yet.
Gatsby Reports
Gatsby Benchmark Reports
Live, visual reports across all 8 Gatsby Benchmarks. Every activity you log updates the report instantly. Export Ofsted-ready evidence packs in one click.
- See your score for each of the 8 benchmarks at a glance
- Drill down to see which students and activities contribute to each benchmark
- Export a detailed PDF evidence pack for Ofsted inspections
- Compare this term vs last term, and this year vs last year
Understanding your scores
- A score of 100% on a benchmark means all relevant students have the required evidence
- The 'Gaps' tab shows which students are missing coverage for each benchmark
- Use filters to view scores by year group, cohort, or individual student
- Scores update in real time as activities are logged across your team
Parent Digest
Parent Digest Emails
Keep parents in the loop with automated, personalised email digests. Each email is unique to the student — no generic newsletters.
- Enable under Settings → Modules → Parent Digest
- Set frequency: weekly, fortnightly, or termly
- Chapter AI drafts each digest from the student's activity data
- Parents see only their child's activities and upcoming events
Pro tips
Getting started fast
- The Getting Started widget (bottom-right corner) guides you through your first 7 days step by step.
- Set up your school profile before inviting the Careers Lead — it makes their checklist smoother.
- Connect your MIS under Settings → Integrations to keep student data in sync automatically.
- Use the Gatsby Report's 'Gaps' view to identify which benchmarks need the most work this term.
- Create cohorts early — they make bulk event enrolment and reporting much faster.