Employer funded study

Employer funded study Increasingly, companies are looking at how they can work with universities to get graduates who know more about their work – one way of doing this is by offering students support and work experience throughout their degree. With sponsored courses the arrangement is typically that you would work with the company during holidays or for part of the week and study at university for a course related to your work for the rest of the time. It’s much the same way that apprenticeships work but you end up with a degree. The massive advantage of employer-sponsored degrees is that you not only get a salary like any other company employee, you also get three years of building-up incredibly valuable experience. That means you’re likely to finish your degree without any debt and be able to walk into a job, potentially with the company you were sponsored by (that’s if the job at the end of the tunnel isn’t already guaranteed which in many cases it is!). The flipside of that is that on some sponsorship programmes you are contracted to work for the company after you graduate, so make sure you’re happy with the deal before you sign on the dotted line. Which qualifications will they sponsor me through? The type of qualifications that an employer will sponsor you through really depends on their business aims and what role you will moving into. The beauty of employer-funded study is that you can bet your bottom dollar they’ll sponsor you through a course that has vocational relevance and will prepare you for the workplace. That’s why most of sponsored degrees are in a business-related subject. Depending on your current qualifications and the aims of the programme, the level of qualification the employer will sponsor you through will differ. Some will sponsor you through HND/HNCs, others Foundation Degrees and many full-on Honours Degrees. Employer’s View: Kevin Gorman, Director of Communities and Practices, Logica Logica offer a sponsored degree programme in association with the University of Winchester, which offers students the chance to study for free but also pays them a starting salary of £13,000 while studying for a BA (Hons) in Business Management. On top of that you get all of your course materials paid for, a laptop to work on and all the benefits of being a Logica employee, such as our home purchase plan, which is designed to help our staff get on to the UK property ladder. Best of all you get three years of high-level experience working with one of the world’s leading IT and business services companies. Students chosen for the course work with us four days a week and attend university on the other day, so they still get a taste of university life. From Logica’s point of view it’s a great deal because we end up with a graduate who is highly-trained and knows our company in-depth. For the student it’s a great deal because by the time you have graduated your salary is higher than a typical graduates would be and you have no debt! So there are a range of benefits on both sides when it comes to employer-sponsored degrees.” How to apply for sponsored study We have some sponsored degree opportunities within our jobs and training section. Navigate through to your chosen field and look out for the sponsored degree next to the listings.

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