Heathrow Airport has broken its annual apprenticeship record with nearly 1,100 apprentices having started their careers at the UK airport in 2019.
Employers at Heathrow – including Dixons, Bradford Swissport, Omniserv, Travelex, Morgan Sindall, Balfour Beatty and World Duty Free – have kicked off the new decade by pledging to recruit over 400 more apprentices in 2020.
Via the Heathrow Employment and Skills Academy, they are working to deliver a further 10,000 new apprenticeships by 2030. As one of the biggest employers in the community, providing thousands of local people with careers, Heathrow will directly recruit 20% of the new apprentices in 2020, providing new opportunities in technical areas including legal and airspace.
These latest commitments come as the airport launches a new campaign to inspire employers, colleagues and local councils to ‘Think Again’ about apprenticeships. The Heathrow Employment and Skills Academy campaign aims to tackle the stereotypes and common misconceptions about apprenticeships, such as them only being available to school leavers. Instead it will highlight the range of apprenticeship opportunities at Heathrow and how they play a pivotal role at the airport.
Heathrow’s chief executive, John Holland-Kaye, said, “Keeping the airport running efficiently takes a Herculean effort every day, and apprentices are mission-critical. That’s why we have already created 5,000 opportunities in the past 10 years, and as we grow over the next decade, we’ll need even more support from talented people.
“With the creation of 10,000 opportunities by 2030, we will continue to invest in upskilling local people and challenge our partners to think further about what makes a good apprentice who one day could be doing my job.”