This week, from the 6th to the 12th of February, is National Apprenticeship Week, which shines a light on the importance of apprentices in the workplace and how it can open up new opportunities for young people to move forward with their career.
Our two apprentices, Isabella Rowling and Joshua Copus – Oxland, are both attending their apprenticeships at Exeter College as part of an 18-month programme. They would like to share their experiences of training with us and their hopes for the future.
Isabella Rowling - Business and Administration Apprentice
My role involves supporting and engaging with different parts of the organisation and interacting with team members or clients, which all makes Devon Communities Together run much more smoothly. A day in the life for me involves communicating with members and people who use our services, answering the phone for any enquiries, managing and sending out emails related to different projects to the project managers, and assisting project managers with any admin support they might need.
Some of the projects I’ve been working on include helping with the data collection and input for the Devon Community Housing Hub; communicating with participants of the Village Halls Audit; helping with timekeeping for Experience Works/Empowering Enterprises; and organising 1-2-1 appointments for Wellbeing Works.
I applied for an apprenticeship because I wanted a different career, and I was always interested in doing business and admin. This apprenticeship has helped me gain confidence by standing up in class and presenting my mini projects on PowerPoint.
The thing I enjoy the most about my apprenticeship is going to college and meeting new people. I enjoy learning something new and getting new skill sets to put on my CV.
The apprenticeship will give me a Level 3 Business Administrator certificate by the end of my training here and help me with my career progression in the admin and HR sector.
Joshua Copus - Oxland – Digital Marketing Apprentice
My role involves promoting the efforts of Devon Communities Together in the hopes of reaching new members of our audience who would find our services useful. There’s always a lot to do at the office since DCT has so many projects, so there’s a big variety of tasks. One day I could be drafting a newsletter for our mailing lists, another day I’ll be creating social media posts, editing videos, designing flyers, or even helping with events.
Some of the main projects I’m involved with are Wellbeing Works and the Big Energy Saving Network. I’ve attended and given feedback to their workshops and have done a lot of promotion for them on social media. One highlight has been working on Wellbeing Works’ ‘5 Ways to Wellbeing’ video series, which allowed me to be creative in multiple ways from writing the script to filming around Exeter.
I applied for an apprenticeship because I wanted to change my career. I struggled to find any work in journalism, especially during lockdown, and wanted to try marketing since that was a way of combining many passions such as writing, design, social media, and video-making. I asked around for work experience, eventually taking a 1-month internship at a marketing agency in Exeter. I loved it so much that it made me realise that this was the field I wanted to get into.
I like a lot of things about my apprenticeship, including the variety of tasks for me to do, the lovely staff I work with, feeling like I’m contributing to Devon’s sense of community, and the course I’m taking at Exeter College. What I like the most about this apprenticeship is how much I get to learn from it, as I’m in a supportive environment that gives me the tools to experiment and improve my skills.
With all the skills I’m learning, not just social media but also teamwork, admin, communications and multimedia, it will be both beneficial in a marketing setting and in other roles with its transferrable skills.
Read more about National Apprenticeship Week and how you can participate in it: https://nationalapprenticeshipweek.co.uk/