EAL Advanced Apprentice of the Year 2014 is crowned
Anna Schlautmann is officially the best advanced apprentice in Britain after winning the EAL Award for Advanced Apprentice of the Year last night (November 13).
The 21-year-old from Wigan picked up her award during the National Apprenticeship Awards at the LG Arena in Birmingham.
The glittering ceremony was hosted by Tim Campbell, the first winner of BBC’s The Apprentice, with Deputy Prime Minister Nick Clegg delivering the keynote address and Anna received her award from Ann Spearing, Head of Quality and Customer Support for EAL.
“It feels really good,” said Anna. “I am really happy to be named EAL Advanced Apprentice of the year. I was hoping to win this national award because I do promote apprentices whenever I can regionally and this will give me a great opportunity to promote them even more across the UK.”
Anna is a logistics apprentice at MBDA Missile Systems, in Lostock, near Bolton, studying for an NVQ level 4 and part-time business degree.
She proactively promotes Apprenticeships, in addition to being a member of the Industry Apprentice Council (IAC), which feeds apprentice views into parliament.
“I am really proud to be an apprentice, and want future apprentices to be proud too,” she said. “I am also tremendously pleased to manage MBDA’s Charity Team in which we raise funds locally; thus developing my management skills for my future career.
“I hope my success will promote apprenticeships to students and will inspire others to be able to achieve such an award and join the IAC to influence apprenticeships. Without MBDA giving me the opportunities I have had and I wouldn’t be here today.”
MBDA’s HR advisor, Gareth Humphreys, MBE, said: “Anna’s just amazing. She joined MBDA three years ago; she is so enthusiastic, hard-working and gets involved in whatever we are doing. She is an amazing asset to the business - she has won lots of accolades and is absolutely brilliant.
It was a great night for MBDA which was also named Large Employer of the Year at the National Apprenticeship awards.
“I was so pleased MBDA won the large company award – a lot of people support our apprentices. When we get so many apprentices across the award categories that tells you about the quality of the training – working with colleges and organisations like Enginuity and EAL to make sure we get the right qualifications. You have to have partners and good qualifications to help young people like Anna develop.”
Julia Chippendale, Managing Director of EAL, the specialist awarding organisation for industry qualifications said: “Anna was the stand out winner among a list of very impressive young candidates. It is testament to her hard work and dedication, particularly her passion which she demonstrates through the IAC, that she has been acknowledged in these prestigious awards.
“At EAL, we are ideally placed to understand the importance of apprentices to the future of the economy, and it is vital that we acknowledge such outstanding talent, to inspire potential future winners and showcase the best of British apprentices.”
The IAC was set up and funded by EAL and sponsored by IMI Awards, the leading awarding body for the retail motor industry. Since the launch of the IAC, members have attended parliamentary debates and input into Government’s Apprenticeships Implementation Plan, which outlines plans for the future of the vocational pathway.
The other two shortlisted finalists in the EAL Advanced Apprentice of the Year award were Drew Reidy 22, is also a member of the IAC who recently completed his Advanced Technical Apprenticeship in Electronic Engineering with BAE Systems and
Daniel Swain, 22, a Mechanical Engineering Apprentice at Delphi Diesel Systems Ltd in Suffolk.
You can view a video of Anna’s reaction here: http://youtu.be/DvrxSvuDq0g
