Two Modern Apprentices (MAs) won top prizes as they completed their second and fourth year respectively of an innovative Forth Valley College and FES FM partnership training programme.
Building Services and Maintenance MAs Stephen Lewis (22) from Stirling (fourth year) and Patrick Carty (21) from Tillydrone, Aberdeen (second year) and their classmates have been working with the successful Stirling based firm, and attending the state-of-the-art training facilities at the Alloa Campus.
Stephen and Patrick were presented with high specification cordless drills by Richard Welsh FES FM’s Central Scotland Business Unit Leader on Tuesday 29 November, after being chosen as the best performing MAs of the Year. VIP guest Colin Agnew Senior Training Advisor of Building Engineering Services Association (BESA) Scotland and Northern Ireland was also on hand to help with the presentation.
Stephen said:
“This is the second time I have won an apprentice of the year award while with FES FM and it feels good. I have definitely improved and I am looking forward to completing my training and becoming fully qualified in May 2017. I would encourage anyone to take a look at this modern apprenticeship programme with FES FM and Forth Valley College as the facilities and the staff are great and the training gives you a great foundation. If you get the head down, get stuck in and ask loads of questions you will do well.”
Patrick, said:
“It has been great working and training here, in fact I did not expect it to be as good as it has been. I am happy to win this award. The MA programme at Forth Valley College teaches you a great variety of things, much more than I thought. There aren’t many places that offer training like this and I would definitely recommend it.”
Richard Welsh FES FM’s Central Scotland Business Unit Leader, said:
“Congratulations go to all the modern apprentices who graduated this year. We are delighted with the progress of these two groups of modern apprentices as they work towards becoming fully trained engineers with FES FM. The feedback we receive from the MAs regarding the training centre at the Alloa Campus, is extremely positive. FES are proud of the strong partnership we have developed with Forth Valley College and look forward to seeing many more of our MAs graduating through this programme in years to come.”
Bill Hamilton a Curriculum Manager in Forth Valley College’s Department of Construction, said:
“Congratulations go to Stephen and Patrick on winning their FES FM MA of the Year for their respective year groups and to all those who have completed their third and fourth years on the FES FM MA Programme. These talented students are pioneers in this field and we are very proud of what they have achieved so far and hopefully they will continue this good work over the next few years.
“We are delighted to be working with FES FM and we look forward to this relationship continuing and perhaps developing more courses and creating employment opportunities across the Forth Valley area.”
Iain McCaskey, Head of BESA Scotland and BESA Northern Ireland, said:
“We fully support this partnership and see the progression with 1st Class apprentices from all areas of Scotland.”
The partnership between the College and FES FM created a new fully equipped Facilities Management National Training Centre to train up to 12 MAs – at least six of which will be from the Forth Valley area - to SVQ level 3 standard over four years.
