Apprentice Laboratory Technician Review

I mainly helped teams of technicians in teaching laboratories setting up and preparing for undergraduate classes. This involved making solutions, growing cells/bacterial cultures, putting equipment out and ensuring everything was safe and in working order. I moved around department through all subjects and sometimes in research departments, this gave me a wide but shallow understanding of each department. I also helped out with any technical issues during the undergraduate labs and then cleaned up after each session.

I have learnt a lot of new skills, both physical and knowledge based. I have trained in nearly all departments and so have picked up subject specific skills and knowledge of equipment and also general lab skills that are transferable to each department. A lot of the theory knowledge was developed upon from my previous knowledge and education. The skills I have learnt are over a variety of subjects, such as tissue culture, microbiology, chemistry, physics and biochemistry.

When in a department of a subject I was interested in, I thoroughly enjoyed the apprenticeship and enjoyed the teams I was working with. However, when put in a department I had no interest/understanding of, which made me very uncomfortable, I did not enjoy it. Most of the teams and technicians I worked with are super friendly and made the whole experience more enjoyable. I enjoyed learning new skills and over time developing some responsibility and becoming a relied upon member of the team.

The idea behind the apprenticeship was very good, getting a wide variety of skills and knowledge. However, the practicality of it was not great, each apprentice was moved around too quickly to become useful to the other members of the teams or do develop skills well enough to be confident in them. We were also put in placements that we did not want to go into due to lack of interest, and also in some placements were not made to feel wanted due to lack of work to do. The timetable of the placements should have been better discussed, potentially with the apprentices involved to better their own experience.

Depending on the department placed into the support given greatly by the teams varied. The overall apprentice manager was supportive in trying to give us the best opportunities however, this sometimes did not come across as intended in terms of making myself very uncomfortable and being put in unwanted situations, this did at one point cause me to get very upset. Working in the individual teams, people were very supportive and helped out with any questions I had and made the work more fun and a better experience.

The training provider overall was not great, there was a lot of confusion a lot of the time and the day release to the college was most of the time wasteful, I felt I could have taught myself the topics and completed the assignments myself. My individual assessor however was lovely and tried very hard to make things run as smoothly as possible with all the complications. They were the only thing holding together us not getting completely lost and confused.

The education from the training provider was not very helpful. Most of the knowledge covered, I already knew so it was mostly a refresher for myself. There was barely any practical skills gained from the college, and any we did complete the equipment was very outdated that it didn't really apply to my work on the job. Overall, I don't think the training provider helped at all for my job role and if anything, made things more difficult to manage.

There is a gym that I attend and I know there are gym classes available for both staff and students. There are conferences throughout the year to attend that are relevant to my work both scientifically and for personal development. I attend these where possible to network with other companies or technicians and find them very helpful learning of other events or online classes for example. These events are hosted at various places, including my own campus to its also nice to visit other places.

Yes

Overall I have enjoyed this apprenticeship and feel it has been a great career development opportunity for myself in a line of work I am very interested in, and has led to myself gaining a permanent position. However, there have been a lot of complications and difficulties that have made my time here less enjoyable. The departments I was most interested in have made my time really great and helped me learn a lot of useful skills.

Being very proactive and trying to get involved as much as possible is really beneficial to this apprenticeship as it can be easy to be left out/behind when in larger teams, and so its best to try and gain as much as possible through the time here.