APEP Product Design & Development Degree Apprentice Review

I am training to be a NVH (noise, vibration & harshness) engineer in one of the full car sound testing facilities within JLR. Most of my time in this role is spent preparing and setting up the equipment such as microphones on and around the car for the tests and then running the test over a digital software. I spend monday to thursday onsite doing this and then every friday we had off to study for university.

I have learnt so much already since i started in September of 2022, from my role as a NVH engineer i have learnt alot about sound and how we use microphones and accelerometers to measure this. I have also had the opportunity to go on two placements in different departments in which i have learnt how to operate the safety testing rigs; what safety restrictions and regulations we have to keep our cars in line with; how to use CAD design software to create and assemble tooling fixture; and what the BIW (body in white) shell of a car looks like and how it is made. We have also learnt a lot of interesting and helpful new skills from mathematics to material analysis to assembly principles. Overall i have learn so many different engineering skills that will help me in the future and despite only being here seven months so far, i have already really developed my understanding of cars and the company as a whole.

I absolutely love my programme, even though we didn't get much say in which department we ended up in the company, i have been so lucky to end up where i have as everyone is so friendly and welcoming (and i am sure that is the same no matter what department you are in) and i have really enjoyed the work i have been doing in sound testing facilities as i have found it all very interesting and engaging.

While the structure of each department's apprentices will differ based the manager's preferences and the teams demands, from what i have experienced everything has been very well structured and organised. On our first week the 9 apprentices in my department were given a clear roadmap for different placement opportunities would be arranged throughout our four years; we also have informal fortnightly meetings to check in and talk about what projects we have been up to and formal check in and placement discussion meetings every 6 months. In terms of the university side of my apprenticeship we have block weeks of lectures roughly every 6 weeks and for these block weeks the timings and rooms for each of these lectures is clearly communicated at least a week or two in advance and any lectures resources that will be used like powerpoints or questions are all available online most of the time before the block week, this allows you to clear see and understand what will be done in these lectures.

We have a large support system in place for the apprenticeship including: the JLR early careers team, who oversee all the apprentices; the university module tutors, course leader and our overall university apprentice tutor; our departments team and managers and in most cases we are assigned a mentor who works directly with us to teach us what to do. As i have mentioned, from the work side of things we have informal fortnightly meetings to check in and talk about what projects we have been up to and formal check in and placement discussion meetings every 6 months and then on top of these as a overall check in on our progress from both the university and work sides we have formal 'Tripartite reviews' ; which we have every 3 months.

As i have mentioned as part of my overall support team, we have module tutors who teach us all the lectures through online and face to face block weeks and we also have a course leader and an apprenticeship tutor. If there are any questions regarding a module in particular are module tutors are normally available over teams (even when it isn't one of our block lecture weeks) and we have university tutors to go to if there are any other issues we face.

Personally i have not found that most of what i have been learning as part of my qualification has linked back to my job role but i can still see how the knowledge we learn links back to other roles and the company overall so even though i don't directly use the knowledge i learn in my role, i have had opportunities to use what i have learnt in my qualification to help me whilst i am on placements in different departments and i have also found that what i have learnt whilst on other placements helps me for my qualification projects and courseworks.

There are a variety of different groups that you can join which then have their own individual events and gatherings but from a degree apprentices point we do not really have the spare time to be going to much events or gatherings. I am part of the 'Early Careers Ambassadors' which go to different schools and universities sharing their experiences and knowledge of JLR and our apprenticeship. As part of this i have attended two events (you are able to decide which events to come to based on your availability and the event type) which was a great extra-curricular opportunity for me and i had lots of fun.

Yes

I have really enjoyed every moment so far at JLR and i have found that no matter where you go everyone is so friendly and welcoming. Even though it is such a big company spread over multiple different sites, the atmosphere is very inviting and calm which really has made the difference as someone straight out of school.

If you are looking into applying for a JLR apprenticeship (or any apprenticeship really) my most important piece of advice would be to do as much research as you can, not only research about the company and it's cars (which is essential information to have for the interview); but also take some time to research int to the different levels/ types of apprenticeship (advanced, higher, degree) and what specific pathways/ apprenticeships JLR offer (this is all available on their early careers website).