Work Experience with Chiltern Rangers

If you are interested in practical, community-based conservation and environmental activities then work experience at Chiltern Rangers is for you. It’s ideal for those pursuing careers in the environmental and conservation sectors, tree surgery, and other outdoor careers.

Chiltern Rangers work with a huge number of community groups, schools, and volunteers and if you are interested in a career such as adult social care, policing, teaching, social work or working with people with special needs, then our work experience would also be a great option.

What does our work experience involve?

Our work regularly involves helping local people engage in practical, community-based conservation projects at a range of woodlands, grasslands, and nature reserves in the Chilterns and surrounding areas. Work experience placements involve accompanying our team of Rangers to get involved with some of the following:

• Thinning trees and cutting back scrub (including controlled bonfires in winter to burn the arisings)
• Step building, footpath & fencing repairs
• Cutting and raking grass in wildflower meadows
• Tree and hedgerow planting
• River restoration projects
• Clearing litter from our urban woodlands and chalkstreams
• Work in Community Gardens & urban green spaces, including High Wycombe Train Station, NHS sites, and school grounds projects
• Monitoring and surveying of trees, wildflowers and butterflies, particularly during spring/summer placements
• General work tasks such as packing trucks for an event, washing tools and kit after use, sweeping up the depot, preparing the volunteer tea kit, washing vans and general clearing up

Only hand tools will be used and training will be given.

All our work experience is supervised by our dedicated team of Rangers, all of whom are DBS checked and First Aid trained.

Take a look at our Child Protection Policy for details of our safeguarding procedures.

Take a look at these films of Chiltern Rangers Volunteer Events, made for us by BNU students, to see what a typical day with us might involve:

Volunteer Event at Buttlers Hangings (Main Film)

Volunteer Event at Buttlers Hangings (Makaton Version)

Volunteer Event at Buttlers Hangings (Polish Translation)

Volunteer Event at Buttlers Hangings (Urdu Translation)

Spring / Summer Volunteering in Community Gardens

As well as gaining practical skills and knowledge about conservation, there are many other essential skills to be gained from a work experience placement with us.  We are part of the Skills Builder Partnership who have worked with us to design resources enabling you develop the core skills of Listening, Speaking, and Teamwork. The Skills Builder Partnership includes 600+ schools and colleges, 200+ impact organisations and 100+ top employers – working collectively towards the mission that one day, everyone will build the essential skills to succeed. We will work through this process with you during your placement, resulting in a certificate confirming the progress you have made which you can add to your CV.

Work Experience Student of the Year Awards

Each year we make awards for both the under-18 and over-18 “Work Experience Student of the Year”. These awards are decided by our whole staff team to celebrate those students who we feel have really shone in their time with us. We aren’t looking for fully formed Rangers, we’re looking for those with attributes such as a good work ethic, initiative, desire to learn, punctuality, and reliability. We’ll also be looking at their journey through our Skills Builder Programme, which is all about ‘progress made’ rather than ‘perfection achieved’.

How do I get a place?

School Students Y10-13

Work experience is all about getting you ready for the world of work, so we’d like to stress that we want to hear from you, and not your parents! We’d always rather receive an email or call directly from you, however imperfect (because, let’s face it, we all are!).

First, check out the chart at the top of the page to make sure you are on the right track. Please note that we do not offer just single days of work experience and would generally expect you to be applying for a 1 week placement.

(N.B. If you attend a specialist SEND school or college, we will need your school to partner with us as part of our Stepping Stones to Employability Programme. Please follow the link to the Stepping Stones page and ask your school to get in touch with us).

For all other students, if you’d like more information or want to check availability of dates, give us a call on 01494 474486 or email info@chilternrangers.co.uk 

You can also read more on our pages with information for students and information for schools.

When you feel ready, just go ahead and complete our Under 18 application form which will ask for information about the dates you are interested in.

Once submitted, we will review your form and if necessary seek further information from you or your school / college. If we feel we are likely to be able to meet your needs, you will be invited for an interview. The interview is an important part of the learning process, but to make it a little less daunting we let you have the interview questions ahead of time so that you can have a think about them. When arranging the interview, we will also send you a film tour of our depot so you know what to expect from your visit.

The interview will also involve an in-person tour of the depot and a health and safety briefing.

If we feel that your interview demonstrates that you’re ready for work experience with Chiltern Rangers we’ll confirm your placement dates.

Follow this link for work experience joining instructions. Specialist equipment such as safety glasses, gloves, and helmets are always provided. If you would like to borrow waterproofs and boots for your placement, just let us know your sizes and we should be able to provide them.

University / College Students & Career Changers

We are able to offer a variety of work placement options aimed at University/College students or those looking for a career change. We can offer long-term placements, summer holiday placements, or a bespoke placement to suit your needs.

Please begin by calling us on 01494 474486 or drop us an email info@chilternrangers.co.uk so that we can discuss what you’re looking for. If we think we can help you, we’ll ask you to complete an Over 18 application form. We will then review your application and, if we think we’re likely to be able to meet your needs, we’ll invite you for an interview. If you’re asking for a placement of over 1 week we’ll also ask you to complete a ‘taster day’ with us as a volunteer. Based on your interview and taster session, we will then make a decision about your placement.

Not In Education, Employment or Training (NEET)

We also work with a variety of organisations to help engage with young people Not In Education, Employment or Training. We aim to boost job prospects, life skills and confidence as well as producing improvements to local woodlands and nature reserves.  Call us on 01494 474486 or email info@chilternrangers.co.uk for more information.

Work Experience Feedback

At the end of your work experience placement, we’d love to hear how you got on.  Feedback helps us to learn, grow, and improve our offer for future students.

There is a form for students: Student Work Experience Feedback Form

and a Form for school staff to complete: Schools Work Experience Feedback Form

Help needed …

As you can see, our work experience offer is extensive and inclusive. We aim to accept at least 30 individual placements each year, plus many more attending for up to a week as a school group. We believe these placements are powerful and impactful for young people, improving their life chances and employment prospects.

As a CIC we are constantly looking for funding to enable us to continue to offer these placements. If your own child has benefited from work experience with us, please consider a contribution to ‘pay it forward’ for future placements. There is a donation button on our ‘Support Us’ page.

For practical reasons, many businesses aren’t able to offer comprehensive work experience opportunities for young people. If your business or organisation would like to support the development of young people through funding work experience placements with Chiltern Rangers, we would love to hear from you. Please give us a call on 01494 474486 or email info@chilternrangers.co.uk to discuss options, or see our ‘Support Us’ page for more information.

With gratitude to the following organisations who have helped to fund our work experience programme …

 For more information and to see how you can become involved with Chiltern Rangers, please do not hesitate to contact us on 01494 474486 or by email. 

We look forward to talking with you.