Investing in future engineers

19th Nov, 2019

We are excited to support Exeter College being one of the first Colleges to offer the Government’s new initiative, launching in September 2020.

T Levels, which will follow GCSEs and will be equivalent to 3 A Levels are 2-year courses, developed in collaboration with employers and businesses so that the content meets the needs of industry and prepares students for work. T Levels will offer students a mixture of classroom learning and ‘on-the-job’ experience during an industry placement of at least 315 hours (approximately 45 days). They will provide the knowledge and experience needed to open the door into skilled employment, further study or a higher apprenticeship.

As a government-selected ‘early adopter’ of the new qualifications, Exeter College is the only place in Devon you can study T Levels for September 2020 entry, with courses initially available in Construction, Digital and Education and Childcare.

SDS is offering local students an opportunity of a day a week work experience, for those studying building services engineering. We have also recently been involved in two projects for Exeter college with T level funding; Institute of Technology, a digital & data centre that will provide dedicated teaching as part of the South West Institute of Technology on the Hele Road campus and Falcon House construction education building.

Regional Director, James Laughlin commented: SDS are proud to support the early adoption of T level training. Work experience is excellent for the development of the student, informing the route their career might take and supplementing their CV. As an employer we get early engagement with potential future employees, and provide personal development opportunities for our existing staff, through mentoring etc”. 

Julie Rogers of Exeter College commented: We would like to thank SD Solutions for supporting us in agreeing to take an Exeter College student on an Industry Placement. The benefits our students gain from working in the industry are massive and we are finding the students are coming back more confident and enthused in learning about Construction and the Built Environment. It is vital we encourage students to learn and work within our industry to ensure an enthusiastic, high quality, skilled task force in the future.

Miles, a Exeter College Student commented: “I am very happy and grateful that SDS were able to offer me this placement as I believe that it will develop my knowledge and skills in building services, which will intern aid me on my course at college. Throughout my work experience placement, I would like to achieve basic skills in using software to design building services. At SDSolutions they offer the correct facilities and working conditions in order to learn these skills. They have kindly given me the opportunity to be able to use Revit, this can be very useful as it is one of the main BIM software’s, so it will be a very good experience and learning curve for me as well as being a very helpful tool for the near future. The staff are very helpful which can be very beneficial to my learning as they are already experienced, this can develop my skills massively which I am very grateful for. This will encourage me to achieve high grades in my college work as they have assisted me to do so.”