Call for university-led apprenticeships

It says universities are well placed to offer a new kind of qualification that “blends academia and industry experience”.

The Future of Higher Vocational report has been co-written by Sheffield University’s vice chancellor Professor Sir Keith Burnett. He warned that despite the main political parties talking about increasing the number of apprenticeships there was still a real lack of clarity about the quality of these programmes, how they link to industry and ensure young people go on to get the best jobs.

Sheffield University say its Advanced Manufacturing Research Centre was the first of the UK’s specialist research facilities to recognise the needs of industry for a skilled engineering apprenticeship programme leading to degree level study.

This evening its first cohort of 250 advanced apprentices, who are employed and sponsored by engineering companies ranging from Rolls-Royce and TATA to smaller supply chain firms, will attend an Apprentices Award Dinner in Sheffield.

The event will highlight the achievements of a new form of apprentices, highly praised by director of global manufacturing at Rolls-Royce Hamid Mughal.

Mr Mughal said: “If I was 16 years old and I was given a hundred choices for careers, I would choose here every time. You cannot ask for a better environment for tomorrow’s engineers to create the complex, customer-oriented values and solutions for industry, the economy and for the UK than this environment.”

The first cohort of AMRC Advanced Apprentices was accepted in 2014 in a state-of-the-art training centre at the Advanced Manufacturing Park.

The AMRC Advanced Apprentices were named Widening Participation Initiative of the Year in the most recent Times Higher Education awards.