News & Events

Personalisation has become a buzzword in employability. But has the employment sector achieved personalisation and, if not, what should it look like?

Just IT selected Aptem as the platform to deliver its innovative IT and Digital apprenticeships. Sam Tobin, Service Delivery Director at Just IT, explains the reasons for their choice: “We wanted to source an intelligent, end-to-end system. The look, feel and usability of the interface was a critical factor for us. The Aptem platform is essentially our customers’ experience of Just IT.” In this article we explore this very successful implementation and key learnings for anyone considering an end-to-end system.

As the ONS has reported, unemployment is rising. The 16-24 age group, who typically occupy roles in some of the worst hit sectors including hospitality, entertainment and the arts, have been particularly affected. However, the spike in unemployment caused by COVID-19 is pan-generational. In August 2020, the claimant count reached 2.7 million people, an increase of 120.8% since March 2020. Notably, there is a significant rise in the number of people unemployed for up to six months, up 202,000 over the year to 988,000. This poses an additional challenge; it’s widely recognised that the longer someone is out of work, the harder it is for them to re-enter the workforce.

When you mention apprenticeships to most people – unless they are in the skills sector – they immediately think of physical, hands-on activity like carpentry or car maintenance. But while there are still many manual apprenticeships on offer, today’s apprenticeship standards also include subjects like data science and advanced forensic practitioner.
Given words have meaning, is it time for apprenticeships to have a rebrand?

GDP is sharply down, and unemployment is rising. Big sectors which have helped many enter the labour force such as hospitality are hard hit and not likely to perform the same role in the next recovery. How bad could unemployment become, and what can we do to arrest its growth and help the out of work redeploy their skills? In this piece we look at the ONS forecasts, compare them with previous recessions and recoveries and seek to draw conclusions relevant to skills training.

Typically things would begin to slow down across the education sector as the summer holidays commence. This year, that’s not quite the case as providers are working hard to get back to a relative normality.

The Aptem development team is no exception. This month we are pleased to share with you our list of updates and upgrades to bring Aptem clients an enhanced user experience.

We’re at the height of the summer, new sectors of the economy have opened up as lockdown eases, and providers are busy planning their next academic year.

This ‘slightly shorter than normal’ list of updates recognises that the introduction of new functionality for better management of bursary payments, is a major development.