Engineering firm KMF hands permanent jobs to group of newly-qualified apprentices

Seven advanced year apprentices at KMF have landed permanent positions with the company following their graduation.

The cohort, who all started together in August 2016, have all completed a four-year advanced apprenticeship at the Newcastle-unrder-Lyme engineering firm.

Now 22-year-old Rafay Ali, Oliver Whittaker, aged 21, and Jessica Mitchell and Callum Hughes who are both 20, as well as 22-year-old Daniel Ellams, 20-year-old Harry Meyrick and Liam Stubbs, aged 23, are settling into their new careers at KMF.

Both Rafay and Liam have decided to carry with their studies and have enrolled onto a degree apprenticeship in mechanical manufacturing at Staffordshire University.

While Callum and Daniel have landed positions as welders and Oliver, Jessica and Harry have been recruited as full-time bending operatives.

KMF’s training and development manager, Jenny Johnston, said: “We are so proud of the seven graduates, they’ve been brilliant additions to the KMF family.

“In normal circumstances we would have had an awards ceremony to celebrate our fantastic apprentices, but the pandemic has forced us to cancel for this year. As all seven are staying with us they will be invited to join us at the graduation ceremony for next year’s cohort so they will still get their moment.

“We have an excellent apprenticeship programme which I’m pleased to say hasn’t been affected too much by Covid-19. We were able to give the apprentices a full month of training throughout July to complete their final assessments and exams.”

KMF is locally renowned for its apprenticeship programme – now in its 14th year – which has grown rapidly since its launch in 2007.

It now has four full-time qualified teachers based at the company’s training centre at its High Carr Business Park base.

And it has just surpassed its first milestone of seeing over 100 men and women come through its doors via the scheme.

The company is now on the look-out for 12 new apprentices for 2021, this includes eight sheet metal fabrication and four machining apprentices.

Jenny added: “We have 30 apprentices at KMF at any one time as we truly believe in supporting young people and developing them into future industry leaders.”