Basingstoke news and sport from the Basingstoke Gazette

Forum promotes apprenticeships

From the archive, first published Tuesday 30th Jan 2007.

A STARTLING 26 per cent drop in the number of students on engineering, manufacturing and technology courses at further education colleges will fuel employers' anxieties about skills shortages.

But Basingstoke College of Technology principal Judith Armstrong is determined to turn that around with the help of local employers.

Opening the Beta Engineering Employers Breakfast Forum, called "How To Improve Your Bottom Line Through Your People", Ms Armstrong spoke of a report published by the Engineering and Technology Board which showed a 26 per cent fall in engineering students across the UK over the past three years.

Addressing local employers at Beta's Merton House training centre, in Joule Road, Basingstoke, Ms Armstrong said: "We believe that going into

the schools, getting at the pupils early, introducing them to the sort of careers that you have to offer is the way to bring those able people into engineering and it's the able people that you need.

"We are really looking forward to moving engineering into the 21st century. You are probably already there - we are coming along with you and helping you."

Ms Armstrong wanted to emphasis to local employers the ability that BCOT has to customise courses to meet local business needs.

The event was hosted by Beta - which, since August, has been working in partnership with BCOT - and was aimed at giving attendees an opportunity to listen to guest speakers on how to improve their bottom line though their employees and share best practice.

Among the guest speakers was Julie Webber, from Basingstoke's forklift truck maker Linde Material Handling, who gave an overview of the company's apprenticeship scheme.

Explaining why Linde runs an apprenticeship scheme, Miss Webber said: "It really does develop well-rounded factory staff.

"We can work with the individuals to see what their talents and skills are, help them define what route they want to take within the company and help them decide on their development options.

"They can earn money while they are learning and I feel, with the ever-growing debt burden that university students face, that can make apprenticeships seem to be a really good route for some young people.

"By offering robust training and development programmes, the apprenticeship is just one scheme that we run at Linde - we do feel that means we are hopefully seen as an employer of choice for people in the area."

Other key guests included Mark Robertson, maintenance team leader at Gillette UK, who spoke about his company's apprenticeship scheme at its factory in Reading, and Mike Rushworth, operations director at St Mary Bourne-based Vitacress, who spoke about business enhancement and lean management.

Alan Gwyer, strategy and partnership director at BCOT, spoke about the spectrum of courses on offer to students from GCSE engineering to foundation courses, while an open discussion was chaired by George Batho, HR director at Linde Material Handling.