Further opportunity to celebrate Oxfordshire apprenticeship stars as deadline for prestigious awards extended

This year’s Oxfordshire Apprenticeship Awards are open for entries until midnight on Monday 20 January

The Oxfordshire Local Enterprise Partnership (OxLEP) have announced that the deadline for entries to the Oxfordshire Apprenticeship Awards 2020 has been extended by a week, ensuring the county’s apprentices – and their businesses – can gain the recognition they deserve at this year’s event.

The annual awards aim to acknowledge the county’s outstanding apprentices, their employers and the education providers championing such valuable opportunities.

The awards – initially due to close its entries yesterday (13 January) – will celebrate their fourth year at Williams F1 Conference Centre on Thursday 2 April.

This year’s awards see many of the categories from 2019 brought back for another year, along with the introduction of a new Apprenticeship Employer Award category for micro businesses (those with less than 10 employees).

The full list of awards categories open for entries and nominations are as follows:

• Intermediate Apprentice of the Year – sponsored by Abbott Diabetes Care
• Advanced Apprentice of the Year – sponsored by Nielsen
• Higher/Degree Apprentice of the Year – sponsored by Blenheim
• Special Recognition Award – sponsored by Popham Hairdressing
• Apprenticeship Ambassador Award – sponsored by Oxford Brookes University
• Shining Star Award – sponsored by Integration Technology
• School Award – sponsored by Oxford University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust
• Work Experience Employer of the Year Award – sponsored by OxLEP Skills
• Apprenticeship Employer Award (<10 employees) – sponsored by University of Oxford Print Studio
• Apprenticeship Employer Award (<50 employees) –sponsored by The Burnside Partnership
• Apprenticeship Employer Award (50+ employees) – sponsored by Clarkson Evans
• Oxfordshire Apprentice of the Year Award – sponsored by headline sponsors High Spec Composites

Nigel Tipple – Chief Executive of OxLEP – said: “The Oxfordshire Local Industrial Strategy lays out the priority to set clear pathways for young people to develop the skills needed to secure future employment opportunities, with apprenticeships a clear opportunity to do so.

“Discovering young talent through apprenticeship schemes can help businesses to ‘stay ahead’ of competitors and – in-turn – support young people to gain great qualifications too.

“Oxfordshire businesses are clearly committed to apprenticeships, seeing them as a positive method to develop highly-trained workforces of the future – through the 2020 awards we hope to engage even more businesses.”

For more details on the awards and how to apply, go to: www.oxfordshireapprenticeships.co.uk/awards. Entries close at midnight on Monday 20 January.