Rail Degree Apprentice Review

As an apprentice, you get the opportunity to learn first hand about different aspects of a project and engage in supporting your colleagues throughout them learning new skills. Throughout the day, you communicate with your team and do tasks that they have set you, whether it be 2d/3d design or working on filling out a spreadsheet, correcting and comparing between data sets. Since this is a degree apprenticeship, you also have uni work to keep on top of, This includes preparing for the lecture weeks, revising and finishing assignments and test within the given deadlines.

You quickly pick up a lot of useful excel skills including useful formula, learning how to plot different graphs and gather different sets of data. Learning how to 2D and 3D design on Microstation and Power Rail is one of the most valuable skills you will learn over the course of your time here as a lot of work depends upon it. Whether it be Horizontal and vertical alignments or adjusting the cant on a rail to name a few. Communication and punctuality are two skills you will definitely develop or improve too because you are always in contact with people around the office and there are many deadlines you must (are expected to) keep on top of.

I like this program a lot and I am very thankful I have been given the opportunity here at Amey. The staff is very helpful and friendly regardless of who you work with and everyone is extremely supportive; It's very pleasant environment to work in. The work is challenging and the uni work is very interesting as well. The uni work and office work seem to merge very well and you can transfer skills you have learnt in each one to the other as it is all very relevant. I would consider the pay to be very good and the company itself takes very good care of you when it comes to covering your expenses through travel and equipment.

The programme is extremely well thought out and structured especially from the companies side and as long as you listen and put the effort in you have everything you need to succeed in this apprenticeship. Personally, I found the Uni to be inconsistent when it came to how everything was organised and it feels as though it heavily depends on the circumstances. Maths for example, was laid out and organised very well for all the study weeks whereas the physics side seemed a little all over the place making it a little harder to follow and learn as efficiently as we were in maths.

The HR department is outstanding in this company and gets back to you if you have any query regarding absolutely anything or need help. As I have stated before, everyone in the office is very supportive and you can feel free to ask anyone about any questions you may have. You are also given a workplace mentor who takes care of you and makes sure that you are clear on everything you need to be making sure the uni communicates properly with you.

We have to attend an Apprentice Progress Review often where they make sure we are on track to achieve our set targets and to point out any areas that we need to work on to improve/focus on. As well as this they make it very clear that if you have any questions about any work we are always able to let them know and they will do everything they can to help you. I have had multiple points in the past where I have had questions for assignments or deadlines and everything was always made clear.

As I have said before I was surprised to find how well work overlaps from my qualification to my work. I can confidently say that my excel skills have improved drastically thanks to what we have done in maths and I was able to transfer that over to my work improving my efficiency. When partaking in 2D design I need to work out certain angles and lengths on drawings which sometimes requires me to use trigonometry, Something we also learnt through maths in university.

This is a hard question for me to answer as I have only been here for a little under a year and we have been in lock down for most of the year which has required us to work from home. However, in the time I was in the office I found that different teams do communicate outside of work and meet up to do extra curricular activities. As well as this, we are asked to join a professional engineering body such as the PWI for example where we can join online seminars about different projects and find out whats going on outside of our workplace; The online seminars are also great as a secondary learning recourse and a way to learn quicker about your field of work. I have actually used a past project that I learnt about through an online seminar in one of my assignments and it really helped me through a question that I would have been stuck on otherwise.

Yes

If your looking for a company that takes care of you and provides everything they promise you wont be disappointed with them at all. You can see the company doesn't take their '3 values' for granted and do put the well being of their employees first creating a great environment to work in to achieve the other two values. I was also impressed to see how flexible they are when it came to anything, whether you wanted to relocate offices because your moving house or something as small as a last minute appointment. The company understands this and shows careful consideration for your needs which is exactly the kind of support you want to have, automatically inspiring you to reciprocate it back through work ethic and respect.

Be yourself and put everything into it. There is no point in going into something like this half-heartedly because you will get beaten by other people who want it more than you. The application process is long and you need to be consistent throughout. When I applied, the company received close to 1500 applications for approximately 30 spots in total, this isn't your everyday picnic and you have to show passion and prove to them why you are best person for the role. Put the effort in and they will acknowledge it, you think you've got the perfect CV? make sure to double check it. Small improvements make a huge difference and remember to never give up.