How you can work with Leicester College

As a business and employer there are many ways we can work together. We can support by helping you train your existing staff and address any skills gaps within your workforce, recruit apprentices, if you are a large employer – we can help you understand the apprenticeship levy and much more. To help you get started please register your interest by going to contact us and filling out the employer form. We will then get in touch to book a visit to your workplace and carry out a ‘Employer Engagement Assessment’. Giving us an opportunity to help you and you to ask any questions you have.

It is just as important to train and unlock the potential of our future workforce and your knowledge within your industry is invaluable and can provide vital skills needed for the future generations. It is important to Leicester College to provide the best work placements, work experience and knowledge possible to support our students and we recognise that employers and businesses play a key role providing the skills required, therefore we can’t wait to work with you!

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How can working with Leicester College benefit your business?

Taking on a student on a work placement, work experience or even as an apprentice can provide you with some additional support that can enhance your customers experience, provide support for staff development and engagement while inspiring the next generation to choose your industry for their future careers.

You can use our partnership to address skills gaps and bring a new perspective into your business all while building brand loyalty and working together to raise our profiles within the industry.

We can also help you meet Corporate Social Responsibility (CSR) to share with stakeholders and the wider public all while showcasing the diversity within your workforce.

You will be working with a trusted local college that has vast knowledge and experience working with small to large businesses providing access to talented new students that are keen to gain access to up-to-date knowledge and start working in your industry.

 

Apprenticeships

An apprenticeship is a job designed to develop work-based skills while gaining qualifications, skills, and knowledge all in the workplace. 

Apprentices must spend at least 80% of their time in work, and 20% of their time on off-the-job training, at the College and in the workplace. 

As a business and employer you have the option of training your existing staff via an apprenticeship or taking on new staff. As their employer, you’ll have a say in the type of training and qualification your apprentice will receive. 

The Apprenticeship Team can offer you a FREE consultation to discuss an apprenticeship levy coordination solution to maximise your return on investment by taking on an apprentice all while ensuring compliance with government funding rules.  

You will have a dedicated account manager at the College to guide you through the Digital Apprenticeship Service (DAS) helping you focus on training and developing your apprentice. 

We can also help you find new employees to fill the skills gaps in your business. Apprenticeships can be flexible – while they are governed by apprenticeship standards to ensure consistency, in practice a variety of different job roles can be mapped onto an existing apprenticeship standard, meaning that you can hire an apprentice to meet the skills shortage in your business.

Click here to access our dedicated Apprenticeship page, to find out more. 

Find out more

 

Work/Industry Placements

Your business can provide Work/Industry Placements from 2 to 45 days+ depending on the type of learning programme a student has chosen to enrol onto, the support students require and the availability/supervision you can offer as an employer.  

The College’s dedicated Work Experience Team will provide you with all the support needed to provide a placement, from recruitment of the right student for your business to evaluating the placement at the end. 

Vocational courses have a range of expected duration for work placement, depending on the level. T-Levels have a requirement of 45 days placement (which does not have to be fulfilled by your business alone). 

 

Enterprise Challenges and Live Briefs

Enterprise Challenges

Employers can contribute 4 – 15 hours of their time to support the facilitation of Dragons-Den style challenges, whereby teams of students pitch and present their ideas on a wide range of topics to an employer panel. 

Live Briefs

We welcome the submission of projects and live briefs for our students to put the skills they are learning at college into action. It can provide a valuable insight into how to apply their knowledge in a real work setting. If you have a live brief already prepared or would like to create one with one of our dedicated team please get it touch.  

Guest Speaking and Workshop

Your personal journey/experience in your life/chosen career is valuable and can be inspirational for our students, as can learning about the journey of the business itself. It means they can see how their hard work and dedication can lead to a career and future in their chosen industry. It also supports the development of wider/softer skills which the college terms as Personal Development. It can also help ignite the passion for education and really change our students outlook on their future. You can provide talks/learning experiences to small or large groups. 

We can also offer opportunities to help market your business and take part in live streams across our social media session in our Ask the Expert and Living Library series and welcome our alumni to come back and share their experiences and achievements after they have left the College and help inspire the next generation.  

 

Have a Stand at our Events

Leicester College host events throughout the year such as Open Days, Adult Open Evening, Get the Job Fair, Community Learning Open Events, Apprenticeship Fairs, Student Enrichment Events and much more.

If you want a stand at any of these events or want to come and speak to our students about your business, we can arrange for you to have your presence providing there would be an interest for the event attendees.

Get in touch by completing the form and someone will be in touch.

Sponsorship

Giving something back – if your business can supply the College with valuable tools of the trade, we would love to hear from you. There are opportunities in all areas and all subjects, we can agree a sponsorship and branding package that works for your business and include you in our marketing, PR and promotions internally and externally.  

We work with some fantastic businesses such as Savoy, British Gypsum, Lendlease in this way already and are always open to establishing other networks of this kind. 

Skills Advisory Groups

Each year the college reviews the way it has taught the curriculum for each course. We have a variety of different groups which give the opportunity for employers to get involved in either designing the curriculum to be taught, using their industry experience, or to directly be involved in the subject specific teaching. Most assessments that students undertake are project based, making them ideal for employers to get involved with. 

Professional Training Courses – Retrain and Retain your workforce

We have a wide range of professional training courses for your employers at all levels, offering training based at the College, delivered in your place of work or as distance learning courses online. There are key courses to upskill your workforce or support courses to help your employees meet their CPD targets.

You can get in touch with us to find out more and see what we can offer, retraining and upskilling your work force can help retain your work force, which enables your business to continue to grow and offer the best services to its customers.

We have a wide range of courses find out more…

Find out more

Recruitment Support Services

We can help your business find the right person to fill your vacancies, we specialise in areas such as security, business administration, teaching assistants, health care assistants, rail engineers, construction site labourers and more…

Working in partnership with Jobcentre Plus we are able to design and deliver a sector-based work academy programme to help with your recruitment requirements as well as promote your vacancies to students, provide a city centre location to conduct interviews*, give you access to internal events and support future recruitment campaigns.

The sector-based work academy programme (SWAP) can support you to create a skilled workforce for your business. Sector-based work academies help prepare those receiving unemployment benefits to apply for jobs in a different area of work. Placements are designed to help meet your immediate and future recruitment needs as well as to recruit a workforce with the right skills to sustain and grow your business.

*subject to availability

What our Partners Say...

“We have enjoyed a valuable partnership with our local college. It is dynamic and has changed to match the changing landscape in which we operate.”

University Hospitals of Leicester NHS Trust Senior Learning and Development Manager

“Leicester College has been a valuable partner, supporting us to utilise our apprenticeship levy in away that provides our people with meaningful development”

Samworth Brothers Group People Director