Employer groups

Since October 2013, Semta has been actively working with groups of engineering and advanced manufacturing sector employers to ensure that there are new, sector specific, standards in place for apprenticeships.

Semta represents over 138,000 companies in the engineering and advanced manufacturing sector. Through the initiative, the aim is to ensure that every apprentice in England is fully enrolled on an employer designed and approved scheme of learning and development.

Each new standard includes:

• Apprenticeship duration
• job role profile
• entry requirements and expected behaviours
• technical skills and knowledge requirements
• a description of the learning and training phases
• assessment requirements
• employer sign off procedures
• external recognition by professional institutions.

The initiative means that engineering technicians in the aerospace, aviation, automotive, maritime defence and wider advanced manufacturing and engineering sectors now use one standard and assessment plan at Level 3, the Engineering Technician apprenticeship standard has one funding cap and one End Point Assessment model.

The benefits of this approach are:

• Simplification and less confusion over the choice of standard
• Economies of scale
• Every apprentice develops a baseline of core engineering knowledge and skills – supporting transferability across the business and the wider engineering sector
• A more flexible workforce with the ability to build upon that common baseline of core engineering knowledge and skills as business needs change
• A reduction in the proliferation of standards

View the list of apprenticeship standards that are currently being developed for all occupational areas