Engineering Degree Apprentice Review

I am an engineering degree apprentice in the first year of the apprenticeship, this year is mostly about transitioning from school life to working life. I am in work onsite on a Monday, Wednesday and Friday unless i am taking part in a STEM outreach scheme that takes me away from site. As far as work goes we spend most of our time working on our first year project and volunteering with our many STEM outreach programs. When we have free time we are expected to network with other apprentices and GE employees to find some shadowing work that will take us all around site and to the many different projects we work on here. On a Tuesday is my university day, its a very long day going from 9:00 - 20:30 where we currently study our 3 modules, Digital principles, Engineering mathematics and programming in C. On a Thursday we have an extra college day in the first year to do out PEO (Performing engineering operations) which is an NVQ level 2 that teaches us all about the practical work environment.

Yes, a focal part of the apprenticeship is developing various skills that will come in handy in the future of our careers. Many of the tasks we need to complete involve working as a team in the most beneficent way possible. Our communication and presentation skills have been enhanced by the many careers events and STEM outreach programs we help deliver. We are also taught about good work practices during training sessions and college as we work in the aviation industry so quality is one of the most important things we deliver.

I highly enjoy my programme, my favorite parts are the STEM outreach programmes and the many careers events as it gives me the opportunity to go out and talk to people and run fun activities to get kids interested in engineering as a career path. However, my favorite day of the week is PEO as we get to have a go at all of the practical electronics which involves designing and creating lots of different circuit boards.

The programme is very well structured, the next 5 years are well set out and everyone moves through the scheme. In each year new roles to organize certain aspects of the apprenticeship are given to us to stretch our abilities further and to contribute to the apprenticeship and organize people.

We have monthly touch points with our manager where she talks to us individually about anything we need to talk about, good or bad. We are also given mentors 2 years above us in the apprenticeship who also have regular meetings with us to help us with any problems we may encounter.

I receive lots of support from my training provider when working towards my qualifications. We have regular meetings with our college representative who comes into work and books half an hour slots with us to talk about college and how things are going giving us an opportunity to give feedback if we want.

I feel that the qualification that i achieve through Bristol University of West of England helps me perform better in my roles as it is computer and electronic engineering which is the specific type of engineering that is most used on site due to the many electronic products we design and build.

Extra circular activities are organized by people around site. Apprentices often organize nights out where we can all get to know each other and have fun. We also organize a Christmas do which is a roles given to the first years rolling into the second year of the apprenticeship, this year we all went bowling and then out into Cheltenham.

Yes

I believe that apprenticeships are the best way of getting a degree is through an apprenticeship, as the company pays for your college fees and provides you with extra training. GE go the extra mile and pay for our Institute of Engineering and Technology membership and help us to achieve our Eng tech and our Incorporated Engineer and one day our charted engineer.

The advice that i would give to anyone applying to General Electric would be to not be self centered, talk about how other people have affected your life and how you use other peoples strengths to your advantage in a team. Also focus on experiences you've had and relate everything back to a story in your life.