On Thursday 4th July 2024, Apprentices and employers from across Lancashire and Greater Manchester came together to celebrate the 29th Annual Alliance Learning Awards Evening.

The Awards Ceremony, which recognises and rewards the hard work and commitment of learners and the businesses that support them, was held at Alliance Learning in Horwich.

The Awards Evening was attended by local businesses, Apprentices and their families, as well as members of the Alliance Learning Board of Trustees, the Mayor of Horwich, representatives from GB Shared, GLMPN, and the event sponsors for the tenth year running, MBDA UK Ltd.

Alliance Learning Business Development Manager, Chloe Ramsden, hosted the ceremony this year and Chief Executive Officer, Dr Gill Waugh, presented the awards for each of the 15 categories on the night. The evening also consisted of guest speaker, Gary Bradshaw of MBDA UK Ltd who shared how Apprenticeships are having a positive impact at MBDA UK Ltd.

The highlight of the awards evening is the much coveted overall 'Apprentice of the Year’ award. The prestigious Award aims to recognise the exceptional commitment to their training programme throughout the last year from the Apprentice of the Year winners.

This year the award was won by Rachel Seddon, from Wigan Council.

During the ceremony Rachel was described as a confident manager with a warm and welcoming persona, having been promoted twice since completing the apprenticeship.

Rachel had the following comments…

“I am honoured to have won Apprentice of the year, I thoroughly enjoyed my time on my apprenticeship. Anne Eshborn is a fantastic tutor and is a real credit to Alliance Learning. The apprenticeship has led me on to two promotions within Wigan Council and I am continuing to implement my knowledge and skills learned into my day to day practice. It is lovely that my hard work has been noted by Alliance Learning.”

Other winners on the night included:

Customer Service Apprentice of the Year 2023-2024

Olivia Essex (Bolton Lock Company)

Business Administration Apprentice of the Year 2023-2024

Onyinye Chigbu (ONS)

Business Management Apprentice of the Year 2023-2024

Rachel Seddon (Wigan Council)

Mechanical Engineering Apprentice of the Year 2023-2024

Hannah Ainsworth (Warburtons)

Metal Fabricator Apprentice of the Year 2023-2024

Charlie Moss (William Hare)

Junior Professional Rising Star 2023-2024

Jessica Jolly (Bolton School Nursey)

Business Management Rising Star 2023-2024

Lindsay Myatt (Howorth Air Technologies)

Electrical Engineering Rising Star 2023-2024

Brandon Roughly (MBDA UK Ltd)

Metal Fabricator Rising Star 2023-2024

Ben Sheible (WA Cooke)

Positive Contribution Award

Lewis Core (Krones UK)

Resilience Award

Craig Taylor (TfGM)

Contribution to Apprenticeships Award 2023-2024

Jim Liptrot (Howorth Air Technologies)

Company Award for Training & Development 2023-2024

Pure Companies Ltd

Employee of the Year 2023-2024

Barry Frazer

Alliance Learning

Apprentice of the Year 2023-2024

Rachel Seddon

 

Chief Executive Officer of Alliance Learning, Dr Gill Waugh, had the following comments:

“The team at Alliance were delighted to hold the 2023-24 awards evening on the 4th July. This event gives the opportunity for staff, employers and most importantly our apprentices to celebrate success!

2023-24 has indeed brought significant success for apprentices, many of whom achieved a distinction for their End Point Assessments. This is testimony to the dedication of our staff to encourage, stretch and challenge our apprentices to achieve their very best.

We continue to deliver high quality Apprenticeship Standards in Engineering and Business, with our Level 7 Senior Leader Apprenticeship proving to be a popular route for employers/employees. Ofsted have recently graded our provision as ‘Good’, recognizing the work that we have done at Alliance to support both personal development and Careers Education, Advice and Guidance in addition to the quality of education.

In May we once again successfully passed our matrix assessment and have gained re-accreditation. This ensures that we are continuously giving up to date, impartial, Information advice and guidance to our learners, employers and customers. The report comments specifically on a range of factors; staff well-being, a safe culture to work in, flexibility to respond to learner demand and employer needs and strong pastoral support to name a few.

Our commercial offer continues to grow evolve in line with demand and requests from our employers with new programmes planned for the next 12 months. We are working to meet the needs of the Local Skills Improvement Plan, working closely with the Greater Manchester Chamber of Commerce. An example of this would be the delivery of our evening welding provision to meet the skills gap in the Greater Manchester area.

I would like to thank everyone who has supported us, our Board of Trustees, the businesses we work with and the learners we support through their training. I’d also like to thank all the award winners and nominees for their continued commitment and hard work. Without them the Awards Evening would not be possible.”