software developer apprentice Review

I work as part of a scrum squad to complete tickets, carry out meetings and simultaneously work on my apprenticeship work such as essays and lectures

I've gotten much better at programming and monitoring projects and working as a team - I've gotten used to using software like AWS, Docker and Jenkins to build software effectively

I really enjoy my apprenticeship and the team I'm with are really friendly and helpful however I do have some issues with QA where countless lectures I've had with them have been rescheduled at the last minute which causes lots of uncertainty and difficulty for me and my team

Lectures are almost never when they're told to be, but the rest of my work is very structured. I get enough time to work on my essays and discovery modules from my team and then I always have enough work to focus on, whether that's shadowing or working on my own tickets and my squad always makes sure I have something to do

I receive lots of support from Hermes/Evri, my scrum master is always checking in on me to make sure I'm handling things alright and always pushes me to try new things and expand on my skills, I also have a mentor who was an apprentice before me as well as a very friendly working environment and I always have help available

I have a personal trainer with QA who always responds to any questions I have within the day - most times within three hours - and then there are review sessions to go over any outstanding work or queries about upcoming events such as my final project. The lecturers always offer out their emails and linkedin accounts at the beginning of lectures too in case we need any help in the future

The apprenticeship definitely helps me and I've learnt a lot in the last year or so which has improved my confidence and independence greatly. It helps that the team on hand has always made time for me but the resources available were fantastic, not just colleagues and lectures but using the Cloud Academy resources from QA in my own time and having access to O'Reilly and Udemy from Hermes helps me to work on my own weaknesses in my spare time

There are sometimes charity events on in the office and online such as for neurodiversity or mental health they're bringing in guide dogs for a day, there are quizzes and sometimes bake sales. There are also sometimes talks held over teams about branches of software or new techniques.

Yes

The company is a very friendly one for new developers and have, on the whole, been really helpful

Don't go into it wanting to be a work-machine, people appreciate personalities and friendliness just as much as skill and they want people who can get on with each other and work well