Mechanical maintenance Review

I am a mechanical maintenance technician and I’m currently in college full time for the first year and on a day to day basis, it changes everyday, for example on Monday, I do mechanical maintenance, on Tuesday I go to Ellesmere Port to do plc’s, Wednesday I do CNC machining and on Thursday it is BTEC.

Yes, I have developed some skills while also gaining new ones. The have developed my skill in using tools and using them the correct and safe way. And a skill I have gained that I have never done before is using milling machines. I am quite skilled with using the milling machines now than when I started.

I enjoy my programme quite a lot as I am constantly learning new things as well as developing my skills as a maintenance technician. I also enjoy the programme because of the other apprentaces which make it fun. I enjoy this because the skills I’m learning will benefit me when I come onto site.

In terms of my employer, they have organised things quite well and they have done quite well at explaining things to us, however the college has not been very good at organising anything. Sometimes, the tutors don't have the correct information to teach us what's in the spec.

I receive good support from my employer to help me progress on my apprenticeship. My employer comes in every 12 weeks to speak with me about how I’m getting on and if i need help with anything or if I have any questions about anything. They also track my progress aswell helping me in telling me where I need to improve.

The support I receive from my training provider could definitely be better as sometimes they don’t even know what to be teaching me or don’t have the correct information to help me. Some of my tutors are really good and really helpful but some aren’t very good.

I feel like the training I am receiving from my training provider is helping me improve my skills and in using different tools that I will be using while in my job role and helping me understand the basics for when I get on site. This is giving me confidence for when I get into my role.

In October, the other apprentices and I are going to outward bound which is where we all go away for a week and it’s team building exercise where we camp for 3 of the nights and do things outdoors like walking, raft building, gorge walking and other outdoor things.

Yes

I would recommend them to a friend because it’s a great company to get into and will hopefully set them up for life with a good qualification. Everyone that I have met at BAE so far have been really nice. And they would be getting paid really well while gaining a good qualification.

A piece of advice I would give anyone about applying for BAE systems is that they will need to be hard working because the college work is quite challenging as well that they need to be organised when they do all their college work and stay on top of all the assignments because they will build up very quickly.