As thousands of teenagers get their GCSE results today and start the massive challenge of finding an apprenticeship, a job with training or move onto college. 

Portakabin apprentice, Sam Richardson, 17, knows exactly how everyone feels. He did his GCSE's last year and is already one year into a mechanical engineering apprenticeship and training with DTA. Here is his experience as told to the Daily Mirror for an article on results day:

Scarborough based employer Dale Power Solutiona have swept the board at the regional finals of the National Apprenticeship Awars with 2 of their apprentices being named regional finalists for Apprentice of the Year, as well as Dale Power Solutions being named finalists for Employer of the Year. Dale Power Solutions have a nationally recognised apprenticeship programme and invest heavily in the training of young people and have recruited 2 new engineering apprentices for 2017 - their CEO even started as an apprentice!

The 2017 Scarborough STARS Awards were held on the evening of Friday 21st July at The Scarborough Spa. The Awards which are in their third year are organised by apprentices from employers in the local area and celebrates the achievements of apprentices, employers and training providers throughout the year. 

Brathay Team Members, Alyssa Wood (DTA) and Luke Woods de Lacy (Rosti-Pickering) were in attendance with team mentor, Bob Watmore. They were invited along to talk about their achievement in the 2017 Brathay Apprentice Challenge, the skills that they have acquired through the Challenge and how something like this can benefit apprentices throughout their programme.

All Staff at Derwent Training Association would like to welcome Danny MacFarlane and Dr Andrew Suggett who have both been appointed onto our Board of Directors. 

Danny MacFarlane                                                                                                                                                                                            Danny is currently an Engineer with over 20 years' experience in the plastics injection moulding industry. He is currently Operations Director at Ellis Patents, an SME based in Rillington with 60 employees and a turnover of £7 million. Danny has worked for Ellis for 14 years, initially as a Technical Manager, before moving into operations. Danny was previously employed by McKechnie Plastic Components (now Rosti Automotive) at Stamford Bridge as Quality/Environmental Manager dealing with customers including Dyson, Guinness, Black and Decker, Hewlett-Packard and Jaguar Landrover. 

DTA will be supporting International Women in Engineering Day which takes place annually on 23rd June. The day focuses attention on the amazing careers in engineering and technical roles for girls, and allows the celebration of the outstanding achievements of women engineers. 

The Women in Engineering Society (WES) is a charity which started in 1919 at the end of the First World War when the women who had worked in technical jobs during the war wanted to continue with this work. A change of law to ensure that the country reverted to a pre-war setting when the War finished ment that the women were unable to continue in their (engineering) jobs, and were unwanted in the technical professons.