I began the Childcare Level 3 course at Weston College straight after finishing school. Many placements were offered throughout the course to help give an insight into what working in this field would be like, including the responsibilities and daily tasks of the nursery practitioners.

My first placement on the course with Weston College was at Little Bears Day Nursery, which then allowed me to return to work there full-time after I qualified. I have now been there for almost 5 years. Throughout that time, I have been able to progress from room support to Key Worker, and then again to Special Educational Needs Coordinator (SENCo).

I think work experience benefits the learning experience at Weston College hugely, as it helped me understand how much more goes into being a practitioner in a nursery, including the impact and responsibility you have for the children that we look after. Placements at Little Bears hugely benefit the learners as they can see how we work with the children, and help gain confidence to achieve good communication with the parents and other practitioners.

In order to enhance their college journey, a learner can experience a more hands-on and practical experience in a work environment, whilst learning and doing the job. It can show them how to work as part of a team and building good relationships with colleagues and professionals. In this field in particular, it allows the learner to deeper understand many aspects including the Early Years Foundation Stage (EYFS), taking good quality observations, and working with children of all ages and developmental needs.

As a local employer and a Career Excellence Hub endorser, I would expect learners to be enthusiastic and have a positive attitude when coming into this workplace, with a passion to work with children and eager to learn new things. I very much look forward to taking on new learners on placement and hopefully, in the future, taking them on as employees!

Kayleigh and Kim, Little Bears Nursery

Weston College continues to be recognised for its highly inclusive approach and innovative practice in SEND and has been successful in continuing to lead the sector for the next three years in partnership with the Education Training Foundation, as a delivery partner on behalf of the Department for Education’s Universal SEND services.

In 2019 Weston College was named as one of the three National Centres for Excellence in SEND, alongside City College Norwich and Derby College and over the last two and a half years, a powerful partnership has been established to share and innovate best practice. Each centre delivers a different theme, with Weston College focussing on ‘people’, supporting organisations to create an inclusive culture, creating a motivational career structure that enable staff to specialise in SEND and professionalise the provision.

This extended tenure means that Weston College will continue to support a step change across the FE sector, improving inclusivity for young people with SEND through their leadership hub and communities of practice, collaborating with NASEN and the Autism Education Trust to join together our outstanding work to support and develop inclusive practice from early years through to post 16.

Dr Paul Phillips CBE, Principal and Chief Executive of Weston College, said: “To retain our status as a Centre for Excellence in SEND is a huge honour. This announcement will enable us to continue the momentum we have gathered proactively informing the sector, sharing good practice, and developing highly innovative and successful provision for all learners.

“We’ve always taken great pride in the quality of our provision and the development of our specialist provision for learner with SEND. The College places enablement and personalisation at the heart of its strategic plans, creating a highly inclusive ethos and culture.

“Continuing as a Centre of Excellence in SEND in partnership with the Education Training Foundation, City College Norwich and Derby College will provide the opportunity to continue on this journey of impact, entrepreneurship and inclusivity ensuring this led from the top of the organisation to ensure no learners are left behind.”

I am Kacey Allen, the Office Manager and PA to the director of Bespoke Building and Carpentry. We do anything from renovations and conversions to new builds, using the latest cutting-edge technology, tools and products.

Due to the pandemic, cost increases have created challenges for us, as well as the availability of materials decreasing, creating a huge issue in the construction industry, leading to delays in jobs and price changes to both us and clients. Alongside this, there was a shortage of skilled workers generally, meaning not enough carpenters and groundworkers for us. As we have two newbuilds currently underway in Weston and Wedmore, we definitely needed to increase the support in our workload.

With the help of Weston College and the Constructing Lives Together programme, we were able to take on some eager-to-learn labourers and give Bespoke the support we needed with the general labouring jobs in the team, to help produce top quality services and products, particularly in the newbuilds currently being worked on. Each of the workers had completed training in Health and Safety, Construction Industry Training Board, and Construction Skills Certification Scheme, as well as gaining re-employment skills – which has been really beneficial to us!

Over the next few months we will be engaging with Constructing Lives Together again to continue to build our team and hopefully fill the shortage of skilled workers and reduce the delay in jobs we were struggling with before.

We would definitely recommend this programme to other construction firms who are looking to recruit newly trained workers, as you can ensure they will be willing to learn and looking for experience on the job. Furthermore, this programme provides an effective process of finding if the individual is suitable and a good match to the company before making your final decision.

We are excited to see what the future holds for both Constructing Lives Together and Bespoke Building and Carpentry, and look forward to taking on new skilled workers.

Kacey Allen, Bespoke Building and Carpentry.

You can find out more about Constructing Lives Together by clicking here.

Animal Management are delighted to introduce the newest addition to the team: baby Emu, Egbert. Egbert’s carers have been spending lots of quality time with the little chick, in the hopes that he would imprint on them.

This is something that Emus do in the wild in order to learn and identify with their caregivers, in Egbert’s case this is the wonderful Animal Management team.

The incredible staff and students have had great success, with Egbert following them around everywhere and becoming a popular and beloved member of the family.

Emus are native to Australia, and so the students have relished in the rare opportunity to engage in such hands-on experience working with the unique and interesting Egbert.

Our Level 3 Animal Management BTEC Extended Diploma is taught at Knightstone Campus, with practical work based at our Puxton Park facilities, offering students relevant and crucial industry experience.

This course provides learners with the opportunity to work with a wide range of animals while gaining detailed academic knowledge of animal science, behaviours and management.

Our brilliant tutors cover topics such as animal health, nutrition, welfare and breed development as well as supporting learners to interact with amazing animals like Egbert.

Our Animal department increases career-boosting benefits through the creation of the Animal Management Career Excellence Hub. 

These innovative subject specific hubs allow for students at Weston College to have access to exclusive opportunities such as this. 

Endorsed by employers from within the industry, this enables for better integration with the sector to make sure class content is relative and opens doors for learners, so they leave college with more than just a qualification.

If you want to start your career working with animals, click here to take a look at our courses in Animal Management!

Last week, Weston College hosted the Institute of Hospitality West of England: Best of the West Conference, designed to celebrate the best of western hospitality and discuss critical issues such as recruitment, retention, and innovation.  

The event was sponsored by Accelerate which is a unique initiative that will provide sector support and workshops to individuals in North Somerset that is funded by the UK Government Community Renewal Fund. The Accelerate Programme has allocated part of their funding to the Best of the West event, as Weston-super-Mare is so dependent on tourism, they want to help local hospitality businesses thrive.  

The conference featured a vibrant panel session which was chaired by Sarah Peters of Commercial Development, Alex Polizzi of Polizzi Collection and The Hotel Inspector, Dean of Services at Weston College Sandra Bull, Dan Flanagan - Recruitment Manager from Liberation Group and Butcombe Brewery and Front of House Manager Chris Bancroft at The Newt. 

Key skills sessions on communication on hospitality for the deaf community were delivered as part of the conference and attendees had the chance to meet suppliers, meet industry professionals and learn more about the training and employment support that Weston College can offer. 

Lynsey Mckinstry from the Business Growth team at Weston College comments “Working with the Institute of Hospitality, who expressed their interest in bringing their annual conference to Weston-super-Mare, we felt that this was the perfect opportunity to offer businesses and individuals the chance to network and be part of the conversation about the industry and the challenges it faces.” 

“We hope all attendees from the world of hospitality found this event useful and that it cemented our promise and commitment to assist with supporting their business growth. We aim to help the industry move forward positively within a sector so hard hit over the past two years and see it flourish!” 

As the heart-breaking situation in Ukraine continues to dominate everyone’s thoughts, the learners on the Preparation for Life course have shown their support to all the people in Ukraine by making badges which are being sold for £1. All the money they raise they are donating to the Disaster Emergency Committee (DEC).

The learners have really enjoyed selling them around the College, it has been a great opportunity for them to practice their communication and money skills. They are very proud of the small enterprise they have set up from scratch.

Learners have visited staff offices at The Knightstone Campus and have started selling them at the “Pop Up Shop” at the Sovereign Centre.

They have exceeded their goal of £100 and have raised £115.75 so far! A HUGE well done to everyone involved!

Whether it’s going into the world of work or continuing their study, we love seeing learners progress to achieve towards successful careers!

Jack, who currently studies BSc Applied Computing (Hons), has just been accepted into a Masters degree in Health Data Science with the University of Exeter!

We caught up with Jack to tell us more about his progression journey from Level 3 through his degree…

Education and isn’t a “one size fits all” situation. People learn and thrive in different learning scenarios.

Those who perhaps struggled in a traditional learning system can really thrive when focusing on a single subject, working alongside like-minded people in smaller classes and having more creative freedom. 

Since graduating from the Graphic Design BA (hons) in 2021, UCW alumni Dan Swan now works as a Graphic Designer for multinational technology company Dyson (yes, THE vacuum cleaner company!) 

Before studying his degree, Will went to Weston College, studying Level 3 Graphic Design and Digital Arts UAL Extended Diploma. 

Dan said: “School was very difficult for me. School’s always pushing you to get your GCSE’s and doing exams and I think not having to do exams and not having to write as much, allows me to shine through my practical design work instead, which is a better representation of what I’m capable of. I came into Weston College just having like my own creative mind and yeah just trying to apply it some how.” 

Passing college with flying colours, Dan then went on to study at UCW, being the first in his household to go and get a degree. 

“When I started studying Graphic Design I kind of had the realisation, that was like ‘oh yeah THIS is going to be my job. 

“Design is a very broad concept to wrap your head around, and creativity is even broader. Having dyslexia, I learned so much more about why I am able to see and understand things the way I do. I think with images and I really don’t calculate words as well. I realised that I had the skillset for design prewired in my brain, knowing what I want to see because I can already see it in my head. I think that was something I learned quite early on in my degree. My degree helped me realise that I don’t have a learning difficulty, I have a learning difference. 

“At university, being able to try stuff, and just see if something doesn’t work – I mean for me, as like a visual learner, that helps me grow and learn rather than passing or failing in an exam situation. 

“I now see my dyslexia as a strength. I mean for anyone who knows that they have dyslexia and don’t feel like they are at the same level as everyone else… it’s because they’re comparing themselves to other people with different strengths. You have strengths, they’re just completely somewhere else.”

The Graphic Design BA (hons) is a full-time Level 6 degree course, taught in Weston-super-Mare delivered in partnership through Bath Spa University. Dan graduated this course with a First Class Honours… 

“I don’t think I could’ve really done it without the support of some of the staff here, and also the support of friends for feedback on work. 

“You need to be able to learn from the people around you, I think something I’ve heard once before was that you always want to be the dumbest person in the room so you can just learn and sponge from people. 

“The technicians at Loxton Campus, were astronomical. They were so good at helping me I can’t thank them all enough. Tracy, Nick and Ash, Charlie – they all had the time for me, because I was ready to apply myself and say ‘I want to do this, how do I do it? Can you tell me how, can you show me how, what should I do?’. They were always really nice and used their expertise to help me improve my practical and digital design skills.”

With a job at Dyson lined up thanks to meeting a contact and hearing about the opportunity through his course, Dan is now working in the industry… 

“At first I was very anxious going to a job, how different it would be, the pressure going on but the desire and passion to do the work, I think that’s what pushed me and made me ready. 

“The subjects we covered in uni really set me up for my career. The core values of design are shared through most things, you can be designing for an editorial piece or maybe a magazine cover and now I’m designing stuff for the application that I’m using now which is the same sort of concept, but just different ruleset that you can follow. 

“The facilities helped too. I was quite impressed when I first came here as a College student because I’d seen anything like it before. I’d never tried any sort of traditional print method but now I understand loads more methods that I can bring into my work. For example all the different sorts of lino printing and using the roller press, it was just so exciting to do to see what textures come out. Being able to use those practices and then try it for myself to see what I like the most. It was a great way to learn.”

Huge thanks to Dan for sharing your journey with us. We hope you continue to thrive in your job and can’t wait to check back in and see your career progressing! A very bright future ahead. 

Click here to learn more about our Graphic Design BA (hons) degree programme