National Manufacturing Day
On MAKE UK’s annual National Manufacturing Day Bennett Engineering invited in St Andrew’s Academy into our industrial unit to experience a workplace in action.
Just one month after moving into our industrial unit on Parcel Terrace in Derby this annual open door event came around; it was too good of an opportunity to miss. Especially as our director, Seleena Creedon, is an Enterprise Advisor which is designed to hook up education establishments to workplaces. Seleena works with a SEND school here in Derby, St Andrews, and is a huge advocate of SEND students having the ability and competence to be able to work in a range of roles.
A day to remember
On the day 6 students arrived with their careers lead and an assistant; the activities were planned which included making your own lunch.
Craig said “I liked how Seleena organised the day with printed agendas but then warned me things would not go as planned due to the nature of the students coming into Unit 5. I was a little nervous of that but ready to be a manufacturing and engineering advocate. What I saw was an excited bunch of kids arrive who wanted to know lots of information about who we are and what we do each day at work.”
To kick off the day there was a PPE session; most of the students did not know what PPE was so the first job was to explain the different items and do this interactively. Craig continues “I decided to use a student and hand them each bit of protective personal equipment and name it then see who knew what it was for, the student who was the model loved what he was doing and quickly became the boss.” Seleena put out a plea on LinkedIn asking for people to loan some PPE to give the students a great experience on the day. She was overwhelmed with the support offered which included a full set of railway PPE from Helen Simpson of Enspired Consulting, lots of types of safety vests from Suzanne of Kedleston Safety and some vest from a local IT company (BamBoomCloud). The students enjoying learning and trying on all of the kit and there were a few videos created by the teachers to use as lessons and for us to say thank you to the people who loaned us their PPE.
Next up was a task that involved two elements; the first was to unbox table legs, remove a sticker carefully so as not to damage the beautiful wood and then to clean down the super sticky residue. These then needed to be reboxed properly and put back into the storage area. The 6 students were phenomenal at this task – they quickly set up a production line of sorts and managed to do 102 in just a few hours which was not expected by Seleena or Craig. The second part of the task was to design a top to go onto the stool / table legs, something they would love to have at school or at home. There were some great ideas talked about around the large table which we won’t share as the students took their design kits back to school to finish off and then return to us.
Feedback from the Day
Charlotte Bushell who is an Enterprise Coordinator at East Midlands Combined County Authority (EMCCA) responsible for St Andrew’s Academy joined us on the day. She said “Bennett Engineering planned a fantastic day for the St Andrew’s students, and gave them a bespoke experience in the manufacturing world. The day was carefully carved to be inclusive and inspiring; all pupils had the opportunity to learn about and test new equipment, and apply their skills to complete real-life tasks. The strong engagement and high energy levels throughout the day evidenced the impact that these experiences have, and how important it is that young people with SEND have the opportunity to be valued members of a team in the workplace in order to build confidence and raise aspirations. It was a privilege to be a part of the experience!”
The careers lead, Tracy Cordon is always looking for viable workplace experiences for her students. She has a real passion for giving every child in her campus the opportunity to see what careers are out there for the students to aspire to post school days. For National Manufacturing Day she said “What an opportunity this was today. We have had fun and got a realistic, hands-on experience in a factory setting. We can only hope that other local businesses follow in your footsteps, offering an inclusive, realistic experience for SEND young people.”.
Finally Seleena provides her thoughts on the day: “I needed to put my money where my mouth was when we moved Bennett Engineering to Derby by providing some workplace exposure to the wonderful SEND students I am privileged to work with as an Enterprise Advisor. And I feel we did. The students worked hard and I can totally see how we could employ SEND students within Bennett Engineering when we have assembly projects that require attention to detail and some hard work. I am so proud of the six students who came along, I’m also proud I am living what I say to everyone who will listen – everyone deserves a place in the world of work so they have a sense of purpose. What a great day!”
