With a breadth of Employer partners across Graduate & Degree Apprenticeships, here we showcase how these workbased degrees benefit business and learners alike.
This month we highlight how both large organisations and smaller employers are equally benefitting from the value that Apprenticeships degrees can deliver for their staff and business and we are focussing our spotlight on JP Morgan and T-Systems.
240,000 employees worldwide
19,000 employees in the UK
2,800 employees in Scotland
200 Apprentices in UK
50 Apprentices in Scotland
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Wayne's background is in Software Development and he has always had an interest in Cyber Security. Three years ago, the opportunity to join a new Cyber Security group based in Glasgow as a developer arose. Wayne jumped at the chance and he is now an Engineering Lead responsible for a development team within the group.
Wayne has worked at J.P.Morgan for 15 years and was looking for a new challenge when the Graduate Apprenticeship MSc came along. The idea of returning to University after 25 years also interested him he had studied Computer Science originally at Strathclyde in the 1990s.
For Wayne, a key benefit is that you can achieve credit towards the degree just by doing the aspects of your day job that are relevant to it. Having 20% of work time available to study helped Wayne make the overall workload of having a job and studying at the same time manageable. However, he still needed to commit a lot of his free time to the GA but, nevertheless, Wayne's view is:
It’s hard work overall but it’s worth it.
29,000 employees worldwide
250 employees in the UK
15 employees in Scotland
2 Graduate Apprentices employed in Scotland
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Our employees have developed significantly during their time at Strathclyde. Their confidence has increased as has their breadth of knowledge and experience. They regular take a lead role in team discussions and play a big part in our onboarding and training process for new employees.
We support our Apprentices by giving them a dedicated day each week to focus on their degree work and also have the flexibility to spend additional time on other days if required. Other members of the team are always happy to offer support where required and our Apprentices are flexible in adjusting their study time around work commitments if necessary.
Graduate Apprenticeships are helping T-Systems as we have a roadmap to substantially increase the team size. The skills being learned by the Apprentices during their degree course put them in the perfect position to help new starts get up to speed quickly and ensure that our agile development processes and standards are being followed.
I would say to other employers considering Apprenticeship degrees that there is an investment on the part of the employers to support the initial phases of the Apprenticeship but in our case the Apprentices very quickly became an important part of the team and their contributions far outweighed the initial investment. Once in the team calendar, the study time is taken into account during planning and isn’t an issue at all.
Taylor, who has worked at T-Systems for almost 4 years, was initally hired as an apprentice software developer through the Modern Apprenticeship scheme and his role involves building bespoke data migration solutions from any source to any target system.
He decided to undertake the Graduate Apprenticeship with the aim of getting a degree in Software Development following on from the qualifications he gained from the Modern Apprenticeship (HND). Taylor specifically chose Strathclyde because the programme integrated more with my work than other alternative programmes.
For Taylor, a key benefit is that his University course work is more integrated into his job role meaning that the work produce on my job contributes to his degree. His advice for anyone considering an Apprenticeship degree is:
It can be stressful at times with both work and University but I would recommend it over just University. You can work towards your degree while in a job that gives you the industry experience needed.