Nursery group opens new training academy

The nursery group of 15 settings across the Midlands and South Yorkshire, will offer training at its new Mayfield House head office, which opened last month, to approximately 100 apprentices.

The training academy (pictured) will offer Level 2 and Level 3 childcare qualifications and the Level 1 and Level 2 Functional Skills programme in Maths, English and ICT.

Facilities include a large training room, multiple seminar rooms, an IT suite and meeting rooms.

Margaret Mason, founder and executive chair of Children 1^st Day Nurseries, said, ‘The apprenticeship remains the biggest recruiter of full time staff into our workforce and is a highly valued recruitment channel to bring talent into the company. It continually re-energises our organisation and is vital in ensuring effective succession planning as our company continues to expand.

‘In addition to giving the children within our care the best opportunities to develop, it is important we provide high quality training opportunities for our staff and I am delighted we are able to do that with our new premises.’

Jessica Lee, MP for Erewash, who offically opened the nursery group's new head office and training academy, said, ‘You can always tell that somewhere is a great place to work when employees have been with the company for years. Apprenticeships are something I have been campaigning for strongly in our area and it is fantastic to see an established business passing on successful skills to local young people.

‘Margaret Mason and her team are an absolute inspiration, so it is a great pleasure to support Children 1^st by opening this new facility.’

Children 1^st day Nurseries is a family-run business providing around 1,800 places to children aged between six weeks and five years old. It employs 450 members of staff and 14 of its 15 settings have achieved Outstanding ratings from Ofsted.