National Apprenticeship Week 2020

It’s National Apprenticeship Week, and it seems like the perfect time to toot our own horn as the Bus & Coach Industry leader in new apprenticeship standards.

For over 15 years, we’ve successfully run our Engineering Apprenticeship Programmes and added our Passenger Transport Driver Apprenticeship 18 months ago. Both programmes offer nationally recognised apprenticeship certification for those joining Stagecoach as driver or engineering apprentices.

The two programmes are:     

• Bus & Coach Engineering Technician  -  a level 3 apprenticeship standard which is delivered over a 4 year period.
• Passenger Transport Driver - Bus & Coach - a level 2 apprenticeship standard which is delivered over a 1 year programme.

The Passenger Transport Driver programme currently has over 370 apprentice drivers based in our English bus network, across 14 Operating Companies. Our aim is to have over 1,000 driver apprentices in the business by the end of 2020. 

We’re committed to developing new drivers, and, so far, we’re the only employer in the country whose apprentices have completed the National Apprenticeship Service certified driver apprenticeships, with 34 new members of the Stagecoach team achieving their certification.

The programme is available to new employees training to be PCV bus & coach drivers, and those who don’t already hold a PCV driving licence. 

The successful launch of the driver apprenticeship complements our award-winning Engineering apprenticeship programme, which has been helping develop our Engineering team for over 15 years. We currently have almost 200 engineering apprentices, and over 700 people have successfully completed the engineering apprenticeship.

Included within both programmes are 20% off-job training elements, designed to enhance the skills and knowledge, and to complement the on-job part of the programmes.

If engineering or driving isn’t for you, we also have apprenticeships in-place to help develop other roles within our business. The successful Stagecoach Graduate Leadership Programme and the new Next Stage Programme are both accredited as elements of the Team Leader/Supervisor Apprenticeship Programme. It’s a Level 3 standard apprenticeship delivered over a 12 month period, and we’re excited to currently have 18 colleagues working towards this apprenticeship certification.    

For further information about these apprenticeship opportunities, contact Matthew Darroch ([email protected]), for general apprenticeship enquiries, or Clare Willis ([email protected]) for engineering specific apprenticeship enquiries.