A fast track career in engineering

It’s a quiet A level physics lesson at Bristol Technology and Engineering Academy. Three of the students are attending interviews at Cambridge University; their classmates are studying in a classroom bursting with facilities that wouldn’t look out of place at a university.

Indeed the £10m campus in Stoke Gifford is a far cry from the outdated view of a technical college. Set up four years ago and sponsored by UWE, Rolls Royce, GKN Aerospace and the Royal Navy, the school is producing students trained to the very highest technical and academic levels.

It’s not just industry in Bristol which is benefitting from their skills, the pupils themselves are getting a huge jump up the career and salary ladder. Last year three 18-year-old BTE students accepted higher apprentices with the Royal Navy; studying for a degree and training on the job with a starting salary of £31,400 – and no that figure is not a typo. 

“They are set up for life,” says BTE head teacher Rhian Priest, and the rest of her students have not been left behind. “If they didn’t go onto university they were left juggling multiple apprenticeship offers which is an amazing position to be in at 18,” she adds.

17-year-old head boy Alex says the school’s close links to industry is what attracted him to study there: “I’ve always been interested in engineering and, while my last school was good, there are so many extra-curriculum activates at this school run by companies like Rolls Royce and Airbus.”

The students are taking advantage of the fact that Britain is facing an engineering crisis; with an estimated one million engineers with skills in software, hardware and electronics needed by 2020 James Dyson says he’s so desperate for a trained workforce that he’s setting up his own university in Dyson HQ in Malmesbury. 

Bristol has an enviable concentration of companies desperate for skilled workers but marketing engineering as a well-paid and aspirational career is the challenge, especially appealing to young women.

“An engineering career is not about having greasy fingernails,” says Rhian. She’s already on the way to smashing the glass ceiling – when BTE first opened just 8 per cent of the pupils were girls; now it’s 15 per cent. However, she is adamant that the “country needs to get a grip and really work to attract more females into science and technology”.

A career which does not seem to appeal to half the population is a real concern for educators and companies however, Bristol is a city at the forefront of inspiring girls and boys, of all ages and all backgrounds to enjoy STEM subjects.

 “There’s so much STEM in Bristol, it’s hard to know where to start, and what to miss out,” says Liz Lister, who works for Graphic Science, an education consultancy specialising in STEM. 

“There are already a clutch of new schools in the area which focus on STEM – BTE Academy, IKB Studio School [in Keynsham] and Digitech in (or near) the city, plus NSETC, Bath Studio School and Mendip Studio School a bit further out. 

“There are a lot of schemes aimed at getting kids in to STEM. A. Lot. But locally one I really like at the moment is DigiLocal, which is running in places like Barton Hill, Shirehampton and St Paul’s. 

“People from industry with a knowledge of computers and coding are mentoring young people in community centres …The aim is to get more young people from a more diverse range of backgrounds interested in high tech, computing and development careers.” 

Indeed wherever you turn in Bristol there is a commitment to getting children interested in engineering. At Bristol has recently opened its Tinkering Space where they can get hands-on with science and engineering and, taking inspiration from one of Bristol’s most famous figures, the ss Great Britain has just announced that it will expand its Future Brunels education programme.

The five-year scheme works with secondary school pupils helping them to explore the connections between the arts and the sciences, go behind the scenes of STEM and explores the impact of science and engineering.

If the money or the career prospects don’t grab the attention of future engineers in Bristol, then maybe a world land speed record attempt involving a supersonically fast car can.

Designed and built in Portishead Bloodhound SSC is gearing up for its record breaking run sometime in 2017. With the eyes of the world on Bristol’s engineers there is never a better time to get into a career which is going places.