Maybe hiring an assistant

[dhicks]

Hello All,

After talking to management a bit over the past few days, it seems it might be possible to hire an assistant technician of some description to help take care of the day-to-day queries and let me get on with the fun^h^h^h more technical stuff. Does anyone have any thoughts about what might be the best (read: cheapest) way to go about doing this?

I'm vaugly thinking this would be a role suitible for someone interested in doing some kind of college / university course at the same time, coming in to school two or three days a week and getting some kind of qualification / certification at the end. I don't think we want to hire someone permanatly - this is a school, for teaching children, IT is a support function, but I imagine we'd be able to offer a full year's placement. We also have a snazzy new drama studio that we could do with sorting out, so possibly someone also interested in theatre lighting / sound would be ideal.

How, exactly, do we go about getting hold of a student or similar? What is involved in being a work placement for something like a modern apprenticeship course? Are there degree courses that involve a year in industry? We are in Alton, Hampshire, which is quite conveiniant for the train from London Waterloo, and we could probably be flexible about start times, so I imagine we could be suitible for someone travelling in from the South London area.

--
David Hicks

[wagnerk]

Via an Apprenticeship scheme. For the first year: £95 p/w, then it goes up to at least minimum wage after a year.

Or you could contact your local college/Uni to offer student placement

-Ken

[mossj]

Are there degree courses that involve a year in industry?

Yes there are however they have a minium amount of hours you have to work to pass the year. If it's P/T you proberly won't be able to offer them that amount.

[sandeep2504]

I took a placement year at university as a ICT Technician although i was paid £12k and that was for twelve months.

Mossj is right about minimum time you have to be on placement.

It might be worth emailing university careers departments and connexions (i dont know if they host job ads).

I'm sure in the current economic climate, university students and even unemployed ICT people would be dying for some experience and would interested in volunteering.

Some ideas i had to relating to a similar post:

Although you can't pay them a wage maybe you can offer other benefits?

E.g free lunch, access to training, travel costs paid, staff benefits etc

[dhicks]

I took a placement year at university as a ICT Technician although i was paid £12k and that was for twelve months.

That sounds like about what we were aiming for - we'd probably be looking to hire someone for a year, and we could afford some kind of wage.

--
David Hicks

[Friez]

Sent you a PM

[dirtydog]

I'm vaugly thinking this would be a role suitible for someone interested in doing some kind of college / university course at the same time

thats what we do - our techie is part time whilst studying at uni. if the uni is local then dead easy to advertise too!

[SpecialAgent]

you could place an ad with this lot notgoingtouni.co.uk - apprenticeships, traineeships, scholarships

[bossman]

@dhicks:

I have always used a company called Itec which is governement funded and it costs the school nothing for a year and this actually gets them through their NVQ levels 2 and 3 depending how motivated they are.

Apprenticeships

Don't know if they do a similar thing down your neck of the woods but would be interesting finding out. Not cost you anything to find out.

[mrtechsystems]

Wow ITEC in Middlesbrough I remember going there and doing me Business Adminstration Level II suprised still going after all these years was a great place