Apprenticeships - Can you assist?

At Brentwood School we are committed to helping our students with any next steps that they elect to take after finishing their studies with us. The majority of our students will pursue Universities either in this country or abroad and for those students we offer excellent support in terms of UCAS applications and personal statement/ reference support to ensure that our students aspire and access the best further education providers. For some of our students, they do not wish to pursue the higher education route and wish to pursue their next steps in the workplace in the form of an apprenticeship.

There are multiple routes into an apprenticeship from the higher apprenticeships (giving students an opportunity to earn whilst learning on the job skills) to degree apprenticeships (where employers have links with Universities to offer students an opportunity to gain a degree where to knowledge of academia as well as the on the job skills are necessary to be successful). For those students who are looking to pursue an apprenticeship we offer support in guiding students to correct employers and sectors of industry as well as giving support in covering letter writing, interview support as well as giving practice for those students who are invited to assessment centres as part of their application. 

We have seen over the past five years that the numbers of students now choosing to pursue an apprenticeship is growing year on year and we would like to support the students even more going forward. This is where we are hoping the Old Brentwood’s will be able to support us. We are aware that a number of our Old Brentwood’s work or own companies in different industries that offer apprenticeship positions. Our request going forward is three fold; 

1. First of all we would like to invite any Old Brentwood who would like to come back into school to provide talks to our apprenticeship students on the industry they work in and the steps they would need to make to gain an apprenticeship in this field. If you can offer any top tips and advice for our students that could make them stand out in the application/ interview process that would be fantastic. We can arrange for these talks to take place at lunch, after the end of the school day or within parts of the day that would work best for you. 
2. Secondly we would welcome any Old Brentwood who would like to be a mentor for any of students who they may be able to gain support from ahead of applications into different positions
3. Finally if there are any Old Brentwood’s who are aware of apprenticeship opportunities that are in the company you work in or who own companies that are looking for apprentices going forward to please let us at Brentwood school know about these as we can pass this information on to the students. By doing this we hope we can create a cyclical effect of Old Brentwood’s ‘paying it forward’ to current Brentwood students who in turn would do the same in future. 

If this is something that you believe you could assist with whether that be any of the three options please do get in touch with the school and we can begin to organise this further and build a calendar going forward.

Mr Oliver Prior - Head of BTEC

If you can assist - Please contact Head of Careers Charlotte Monk (monkc@brentwood.essex.sch.uk)