{"id":374036,"date":"2025-08-26T04:25:10","date_gmt":"2025-08-26T04:25:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/374036\/"},"modified":"2025-08-26T04:25:10","modified_gmt":"2025-08-26T04:25:10","slug":"oldham-youngsters-followed-by-tv-cameras-on-exciting-day","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/374036\/","title":{"rendered":"Oldham youngsters followed by TV cameras on &#8216;exciting&#8217; day"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>\n  Last week, Channel 4 News was in town\u00a0filming some of First Choice Homes Oldham\u2019s (FCHO) apprentices for a feature about GCSE results day.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  Trainee joiners Angelise Johnston, 17, and\u00a0Devon Laithwaite-Adair, 18, along with recently qualified electrician Jordan Kemp, 25, all talked about why they have taken the apprenticeship path rather than A Levels.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  The group were filmed\u00a0at an empty property in Greenacres as FCHO looks to more than double the number of its apprentices by 2027.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  <strong>Get the latest news delivered straight to your inbox by signing up to\u00a0<a href=\"https:\/\/www.theoldhamtimes.co.uk\/my\/account\/profile\/#emails\" target=\"_blank\" rel=\"noopener\">The Oldham Times&#8217; morning and evening newsletters<\/a>\u00a0as well as our breaking news alerts<\/strong>\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  Angelise told the reporter she is a first-year apprentice and did not want to go to college after leaving school, explaining that\u00a0she wanted a hands-on role following some voluntary experience at a community centre doing maintenance work.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  Meanwhile, Devon started A Levels studying medical science, PE and psychology to become a physio before he realised it was not for him and he applied to FCHO.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  He said: \u201cI was fortunate to get a place and since I\u2019ve started, I\u2019ve had lots of support and been helped by my mentors.\u201d\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  <img   alt=\"From left to right: Devon Laithwaite-Adair, Jordan Kemp, Angelise Johnston\" style=\"width: 100%;\"\/>From left to right: Devon Laithwaite-Adair, Jordan Kemp, Angelise Johnston (Image: FCHO)\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  Jordan told the film crew he had always liked fixing things and because he also liked maths, becoming an electrician felt like the best option.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  He said: \u201cI have finished my apprenticeship and now secured a full-time role with FCHO.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  \u201cI have become a lot more confident and developed my people skills, as I&#8217;m working in customer\u2019s houses daily, so you must learn to speak to people and have conversations.\u201d\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  FCHO multi-skilled joiner and apprentice mentor Chris Duxbury told Channel 4: \u201cWe\u2019ve got a skills shortage, and we need to safeguard trades by attracting people to the sector, where they can earn good money and develop valuable life skills.\u201d\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  Recommended reading:\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  Mark Gifford, chief executive at FCHO, said: \u201cIt was exciting having Channel 4 with us\u00a0and a real confidence boost for our apprentices, our colleagues and FCHO to have highlighted in this way the good work we are achieving with our apprenticeship programme.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  \u201cWe need to skill local people in the important trades needed to build the homes the area is desperate for. That\u2019s why we are going to at least double our apprentice numbers by 2027 to 22 &#8211; a target we expect to beat.\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  \u201cI also echo what Chris said. We must recognise there is a skills shortage in construction and we are working hard to fill it in partnership with Oldham College while also offering real quality choices for young people who do not want to go down the academic path and the debt it might entail.\u201d\n<\/p>\n<p>\n  The footage was aired on Channel 4 News on GCSE results day (Thursday, August 21).<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Last week, Channel 4 News was in town\u00a0filming some of First Choice Homes Oldham\u2019s (FCHO) apprentices for a&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":374037,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[8813],"tags":[748,393,4884,2465,16,15],"class_list":{"0":"post-374036","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-manchester","8":"tag-britain","9":"tag-england","10":"tag-great-britain","11":"tag-manchester","12":"tag-uk","13":"tag-united-kingdom"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115093171427911301","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374036","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=374036"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/374036\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/374037"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=374036"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=374036"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=374036"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}