Throughout National Apprenticeship Week (7 – 13 February 2022), Newbury College and University Centre Newbury (UCN) have been recognising the incredible contribution that apprenticeships make towards building the future and highlighting some outstanding examples with their annual Apprenticeship Awards.
Following the success of last year’s format, the winners were announced during the week on the Newbury College and UCN social media channels alongside videos and interviews with employers and apprentices, showcasing how they are benefiting from utilising apprenticeships to progress their businesses and careers.
Dr Jo Houghton, Director of Business and Partnerships, UCN and Newbury College, said: “National Apprenticeship Week is a fantastic opportunity for us to recognise the hard work and commitment of our apprentices, employers and their supporting network, and announce our annual award winners.
“Apprenticeships are playing a vital role in supporting the rebuilding of the economy and enable businesses to recruit and upskill staff with the practical skills and underpinning knowledge that future-proofs their businesses. Now more than ever, we want to showcase and support businesses and apprentices to reap the benefits of apprenticeship programmes.”
The winners are:
Ethan has been an asset to Nustream, evidencing great time keeping, positive attitude and ability to take on any new tasks. He has shown enormous drive and determination and is already supporting newer apprentices entering the business. He goes above and beyond, even successfully completing the Xerox Selling for Success Course in addition to his apprenticeship. Annaleize takes good direction and uses her initiative and is constantly developing her communication skills both internally and with external customers. Ocean Partners are confident Annaleize will progress to an excellent administrator. Faye did not have any previous engineering experience but has a great personality, fantastic enthusiasm, and a natural inquisitive engineering mind. She started her apprenticeship journey in 2019 and served the first two years of her Apprenticeship working through a tour of Xtrac’s factory and now working in CNC Turning, she has worked in 16 departments for over 17 months, accruing a vast array of engineering skills. Her progress has been exemplary both in the workplace and in her college work. Faye has also assisted Xtrac with their Schools outreach program attending many STEM and careers events and was a key speaker promoting Engineering and Apprenticeships to a large audience. Faye has a real passion for Engineering and shows she is prepared to go the extra mile and has very high standards. Ravi wins this award for the second year running. She continues to show support and motivation to her students, developing a desire in students to look for the finer details and take their work to the next level in order to achieve higher grades. She always makes time for her students. Rama goes above and beyond for her apprentices and the wider Ocean Partners team. She takes time to support apprentices with understanding and patience and has helped her apprentice to develop their confidence within the business role and in general. Cliff has done an exemplary job of developing apprentices. He goes well beyond what is expected in supporting them and the employers. Xtrac commented: "Cliff’s help and support in preparing Jamie Rusbridge for his endpoint assessment for his L6 Engineering Design and Development Apprenticeship has been faultless and Cliff’s experience and patience has proved dividends. Cliff’s way of getting learners to understand what they have to do has a kind, caring and enthusiastic manner which gets the best out of them. Cliff has worked with us developing various new Engineering Standards Apprenticeships by deciphering the EPA plans. It's always good to have someone work with us who understands our business needs as well as the learners. A big thank you to Cliff for all of his support over the last year." Nustream is hugely supportive of apprenticeships and the value they bring to business. They are supporting their apprentices to progress with a broad range of transferrable skills and business acumen. Ocean Partners UK Limited welcomes and includes their apprentices from the outset, ensuring they are nurtured to find their fit in the team and the organisation as well as embedding the skills, knowledge and behaviours needed that both support the development of their apprentices and their business. Xtrac is an outstanding example of a firm that has embedded apprenticeships within the infrastructure of its business. They nurture, engage and progress apprentices on the programme and do fantastic work in engaging with schools to highlight STEM opportunities and spark a passion with a new generation of engineers.
Newbury College is creating opportunities to transform lives and has been supporting the local economy with innovative apprenticeship programmes for over 70 years. The apprenticeship programmes offered by Newbury College and UCN are performing at 14.2% above the national average overall, with the apprenticeship standard achievement rate at 26.6% above.
Together, Newbury College and UCN are supporting local people and employers to explore opportunities that develop a strong, knowledgeable workforce; meet the changing needs of the economy; encourage career development; and enable them to build the future.
To discover how your business could benefit visit our apprenticeships page or email This email address is being protected from spambots. You need JavaScript enabled to view it.