This year, National Apprenticeship Week is being celebrated for a full week commencing Monday 6th February. It is an opportunity for the education and skills sector to celebrate the achievements of apprentices around the country.
At MGF, we value our apprentices, providing them with all the support and guidance necessary to fulfil and exceed in both their coursework and day to day role. We have apprentices in almost every department in our business, from marketing to HR, engineering to procurement, as well as apprentices in our hands-on roles in manufacturing and in the yard.
We have lots of success stories, with some of our most qualified workers being ex-apprentices whom MGF have continuously developed throughout their career by encouraging and supporting enrolment in additional courses and apprenticeships.
We asked our apprentices a few questions about why they personally were motivated to pursue an apprenticeship with MGF, here is what they had to say:
“Once I’d worked for MGF for a year, they encouraged me to enrol onto a course to aid my personal development in line with the graduate trainee manager role.”
Rebecca Smith BSc (Hons) – Graduate Management Trainee
“When MGF visited my high school, they offered an apprentice pathway that I felt was perfect for my next step in life. They revealed their in-depth plan for the future of engineering and showed their commitment to developing a new generation of engineering talent.”
Oliver Briggs – Trainee Apprentice Engineer
“I had taken part in work experience with MGF during high school where I was exposed to the passionate culture across the business and knew it was something I wanted more of. I saw a vacancy in marketing and knew it was the right step for me after finishing my A Levels.”
Johb Coates – Marketing Apprentice
We also asked them to describe the advantages they saw in apprenticeships over traditional further education, with many different aspects highlighted.
“The main advantage for myself is both learning knowledge of wider industries in procurement & gaining transferrable skills in the workplace which will both improve my performance and also provide me with a chartership in something which I am interested in, so will benefit me throughout my career.”
– Matt Donaldson MSc – Graduate Management Trainee
A key theme in the responses to this question was the idea of learning while you earn, having more work experience than those who go down the traditional college and university route and gaining knowledge of the construction industry as well as wider sectors. These are huge advantages of apprenticeships, as they lack the financial burden of a student loan, whilst providing a similar level of education and more work experience.
Recently, MGF’s engineering department have started a new apprenticeship scheme called Grass Routes, headed by our Engineering Manager, Lee Womersley, which takes students who have just left high school and offers them an academic journey all the way through to becoming chartered engineers. This is representative of MGF’s commitment to developing young talent and fostering interest in the Civil Engineering sector. We recently visited schools local to MGF’s Foundation House, such as Fred Longworth, to advertise this scheme with great interest from young pupils making it a successful exhibition.
For more on MGF’s Careers
