Unions delivering on diversity
Unions are working to help extend opportunities to Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) young people and adults.
Lennord Carroll was in his early 50s and had been out of work for nearly six months when his local Jobcentre in Leeds set him up with an interview for a financial services apprenticeship with Barclays.
The former dancer and teacher hadn’t thought of the financial sector as an option before the opportunity arose.
Lennord said:
What really attracted me was the possibility of being an apprentice at the age of 53 and learning something different from what I’d done before.”
While undertaking his apprenticeship, Lennord was working in the complaints department as a decision-maker, and completed his NVQ Level 2 with a distinction in customer service.
The study component was delivered on site, with a talent scout coming in once a month to help all five apprentices with their course materials and lead discussions on the subjects they were covering.
Lennord joined Unite when he started the apprenticeship, and was more than happy when he was asked to speak to Black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) sixth-formers at an Apprenticeship Forum in London organised by The Voice newspaper when he was around six months in to his programme.
The event was designed to improve take-up of apprenticeships among BAME sixth-formers and college students, since only 10.7 per cent of apprenticeship starts in 2014/15 were by BAME youth, although BAME people make up 21.6 per cent of the working age population in England.
The Voice ran the event in conjunction with the National Apprenticeship Service (NAS) and global banking firm HSBC, which hosted the day at its global headquarters in London’s Docklands during National Apprenticeship Week 2016.
Unionlearn was one of the nine major organisations that gave presentations and led small-group networking opportunities for the participants, which is where Lennord took the chance to speak with the young people about his own experience.
Lennord said:
It was a good experience to go down to London and talk to these young people: I like talking to kids and giving them advice, as I have done in the past when I was teaching dance.
A lot of the young people came up with good questions regarding Apprenticeships and I enjoyed trying to give them an insight into how an Apprenticeship could work for them, finding a good role that would help them find a proper job afterwards.”
When a new opportunity arose 15 months into his Apprenticeship, Lennord decided to move into the print sector and was happy to secure a new job with Communisis, the country’s largest printer of chequebooks (its clients include Barclays), where he remains a Unite member.
Lennord commented that
The union contacted me after the Apprenticeship Forum and I hope I can continue with being a part of the work, because it was good fun working with Unite and those young people.”
This case study first appeared in “Unionlearn - Unions supporting high-quality Apprenticeships” which can be downloaded from the unionlearn website:
