It’s always wonderful to celebrate the achievements of our apprentices. After a few years of being unable to hold physical events, it was wonderful to get everyone together in person to hold our Apprenticeship Awards Evening for our Coventry apprentices on 26 January. The Awards have been decided by the MGTS delivery team, after great deliberation. They have worked with and trained each apprentice throughout the academic training year, so they know the individuals’ strengths and weaknesses well.

Without further ado…the nominees and winners are:

Electrical Maintenance Apprentice of the Year

Nominees: Niall Tierney – Brose / Jack Dale – Molson Coors / Oliver Bodfish – Amtico / Jack Fellows – Glen Dimplex

Winner: Jack Dale – Molson Coors

Jack from the outset performed consistently above average, demonstrating an ability to quickly grasp new subject matter and apply the new skills and knowledge to produce tasks of an excellent standard early in his training. He was able to maintain that level of ability and approach throughout the training year, performing exceptional well in the fields of electrical maintenance, fluid power and mechanical maintenance, due to his attention to detail.

Mechanical Apprentice of the Year

Nominees: Rhys Chudasma – Quartzelec / Oliver O’Regan – Matrix Machine Tools / James Baker – Crown Packaging / Joshua Perry – Nasmyth Henton Ltd

Winner: James Baker – Crown Packaging

James definitely has an exceptional mechanical aptitude, he developed knowledge and skills quickly which enabled him to produce an excellent standard of workmanship, very early on in his training. The level of application, motivation and effort applied by James never wavered throughout the whole for the first year training period, even when being faced with and exposed to new engineering disciplines.

Most Improved Apprentice of the Year

Nominees: Ioannis Tserkezidis – TGW / Peter Brown – Quartzelec

Winner: Ioannis Tserkezidis – TGW Limited

The distance travelled from where Ioannis started to where he is now is incredible. He had at times, a negative attitude towards his training and a disinterest, achieving only average results and not fully appreciating the opportunity offered to him. It wasn’t until half-way through the year that the penny dropped and we saw the new focused, engaged and committed Ioannis. Where had this person been, he was now a changed man! He continued to perform exceptionally well for the remainder of the training year, achieving the highest of grades.

Apprentices’ Apprentice of the Year

Nominees: Damon Bayliss – Siemens Healthineers / Ryan Fisher – Unipart / Miles Forrester – Molson Coors / Adam Percival – Pepsico

Winner: Miles Forrester – Molson Coors

This is an interesting award because it is voted for by the apprentices for their fellow apprentice that they feel has been supportive, approachable, engaging and generally a good person. Miles was nominated by his peers because he’s a really nice person, always willing to support his fellow colleagues that asked for his support, advice or guidance, always willing to go the extra mile.

Overall Apprentice of the Year

Nominees: Jack Dale – Molson Coors / Harry Waddington – TGW Limited / James Baker – Crown Packaging

Winner: Harry Waddington – TGW Limited

Harry is a quiet unassuming character, who is able to adapt to any training scenario and produce work of the highest quality. He understands and knows what is expected of him, he picks up new processes and practices quickly which accelerates his ability to develop competence, this has been especially so in the field of automation and controls. His sustained level of engagement, application, motivation and interest has served him well throughout the first year of his training and enabled him to develop a focus and determination to succeed at all he undertakes.

BTEC 1st Year Apprentice of the Year – Winner: Adam Percival – Pepsico

Sometimes the quietly capable learners can be overlooked because they just get on with the work and never cause any trouble so it is a real pleasure to be able to award Adam with this award in recognition of his quiet and methodical approach to his studies.  He has achieved100% attendance on BTEC days, is committed to his studies and highly capable. Adam received Distinctions across the board for his first year subjects and now he is on target to get Distinctions for his year 2 BTEC subjects!

BTEC Programme Apprentice of the Year – Winner: Sean Williams – Dennis Eagle

A couple of weeks into studying the Further Maths unit in year two Sean had a bit of a wobble and believed that the unit was perhaps beyond his level of competence. But he persevered and achieved the unit well with a Pass. In fact a quote from his tutor “Sean is the epitome of what hard work and dedication can do” – wow – high praise indeed. Sean did really well overall in the BTEC, particularly excelling in Electrical Principles, Engineering Design and Engineering Materials, and achieved a Distinction overall for the Diploma.

HNC Student of the Year – Winner: Bob Wilson – Air Kraft

This HNC award is special. To get to this point, you have likely completed 4 years of Further Education with MGTS…(4 years at one day a week – is actually 816 hours of lessons). So to be nominated to receive it from the staff you must have either been consistently brilliant for 4 years or somebody we have been able to watch grow and mature into the academic side of their study. In this case Bob has been a grower. A quote from one of the tutors was “Bob has really developed and matured over the time I’ve taught him, he has become a pleasant and hardworking person and engineer”. Receiving a merit overall for his HNC, Bob excelled in Engineering Design, Renewable Energy, Digital Principles and a special mention for Professional Engineering Project where his tutor has commented that his project was of the highest quality and showed true commitment.

Advanced Apprentice Graduate Award

This award is based on an individual’s consistently high performance across the four year duration of the apprenticeship.

Nominees: Michael Kraus – ABB / Bailey Wiggett – Amtico / Daniel Birch – Dennis Eagle / Connor Potter – Barry Callebaut

Winner: Bailey Wiggett – Amtico

What made Bailey stand out over other apprentices is that she relished any challenge and always went the extra to mile to succeed and overcome any barriers she encountered. She has been instrumental in the design and implementation of several projects at Amtico which have contributed to significant cost savings for the company.

Bailey has also overcome her lack of self-belief and completed both the BTEC qualification and the HNC programme, gaining a Distinction in maths. Through sheer hard work and determination, Bailey always put in the extra hours required to develop to her full potential.  Her achievements are a testament to what can be achieved by any apprentice working in partnership with both their employer and MGTS.

Finally we have our Mentor Recognition Award.

The role of the mentor is undoubtedly of paramount importance to the training and development of the apprentice in the workplace. Without mentors the focus is lost. These people are the unsung heroes of apprenticeships in developing the next generation of our engineers.

We have pleasure in recognising the following gentlemen for their dedication towards their apprentices:

  • Anthony Hyams – Ardagh Group
  • Robert Pratt – Becketts Foods
  • Keith Fisher – Jacobs Douwe Egberts
  • Grant Pearson – RS Components

Congratulations to all the winners!

Photography: Dave Warren – Picture Team