Monday, 10 February 2025
Happy National Apprenticeship Week to all our employers, apprentices, and staff members who make up our incredible apprenticeship community! This week is a time to celebrate all the brilliant things we’ve achieved together from our award-winning apprentices to our achieving a Good’ rating from our first Ofsted inspection.
At the university, we’re proud to have created a space where organisations can develop the skills their industries need and where apprentices make a real-world impact. We’re thankful to our partner employers for their support of our programmes over the years and to our apprentices for making us proud in their respective fields.
So, let’s celebrate some of our collective achievements!
A year of growth and success
This year saw us win Training Provider of the Year at the Derbyshire & Nottinghamshire Apprenticeship Awards 2024, recognising our strong employer relationships and commitment to delivering apprenticeships that make a difference within the workplace.
We also received a ‘Good’ rating in our first Ofsted Inspection, highlighting our industry links, excellent collaboration with our partner employers and employer satisfaction with our Degree Apprenticeships. The inspection explored every corner of our apprenticeship provision, and we were proud to have been able to demonstrate the value of the work we do.
This shows when we work in collaboration with our partner employers and apprentices, we succeed together – there’s nothing we want more than that!
Our apprentices’ success on their Degree Apprenticeship programme
We’d also like to celebrate some of our apprentices’ success across our programmes this year as they have made significant contributions to their workplaces on their respective programmes.
We were delighted that our Data Scientist Degree Apprentice, Luca Smith, recently won Technology and Digital Apprentice of the Year 2024 at the Derbyshire & Nottinghamshire Apprenticeship Awards 2024 for implementing modern coding practices and cloud-based tools which have brought valuable benefits to their employer.
Our Architect Degree Apprentice, Rachel Levy, won the coveted RIBA Silver Medal Nomination Award at the university’s annual architecture end of year show 2024 for her design portfolio which demonstrates excellent quality, creativity, and commitment to sustainable design principles, making a significant contribution to her practice. She was also shortlisted for the AJ New Talent Award demonstrating the industry recognition our apprentices are receiving.
Their wins are a fantastic example of how our apprentices are delivering real industry impact and developing skills that are enabling them to make significant contributions to their workplaces.
Our programme highlights
We’ve also seen several successes across our Degree Apprenticeship programmes that we hope you’ll join us in celebrating as:
*Individualised Learner Records (ILR) start data published by the ESFA 2021-24
Plus, we’ve added two new apprenticeship programmes to our offering:
Looking ahead to the future
How do we continue to work together in the skills space to innovate, expand, and create even more collective success across our programmes?
As we celebrate National Apprenticeship Week 2025, we remain committed to the growth and development of our apprenticeship programmes to support skills development within the workplace.
“National Apprenticeship Week is all about recognising the impact that apprenticeships are making across the country, both in industry and in our communities. It’s been a fantastic year for apprenticeships at the university; the successes we have seen can only be possible with the close collaboration and input from our partner employers and apprentices.”
If you would like to find out more about our programmes and discover how degree apprenticeships can make a real difference to your business, we encourage you to join us for our Degree Apprenticeship Employer Engagement Day on Tuesday 4 March.
Find out more about what to expect and save your space.