Nursery World Awards 2022 - Early Years Apprentice of the Year

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Jack never lets his severe medical condition and learning disability stop him taking a full part in nursery activities.

He works part time as anursery practitioner as a result of his health conditions, but is fully capable of leading activities and builds up excellent relationships with children, staff and parents alike. He has an accepting nature and is very keen to learn and extend his knowledge, taking ownership of his work and keen to ask questions to develop his practice.

Jack has been seriously ill from an early age, and has had numerous long stay hospital episodes. He can be socially anxious in new situations, so starting an apprenticeship was a huge step.

Jack has overcome and is still dealing with so many health issues, and yet he has managed to find a career where he can excel and show young children and their parents that you can achieve and fulfil your dreams despite the hurdles.

Jack is passionate about supporting children with additional needs and helping their parents understand that their children can achieve, especially after his own experiences of lack of support at school.

He is responsible for key children and has just completed his longitudinal study which focused on developing speech and language for a child with autism. This involved working in partnership with a speech and language therapist. Jack was able to contribute his own personal experience in relation to language understanding and how this might affect a child’s acquisition of speech.

Jack is taking a lead in introducing a language-rich environment to the setting’s early development room.

He also takes an active role in staff training, bringing ideas to discussions and supporting colleagues, and is helping to support the nursery’s sustainability work through its monthly ‘Family Freebies’ events, which provide free food, clothes, household items and toys to families and staff who need them.

This involves finding items, asking for donations, sorting the donated items and making sure they are fit for purpose, which requires him to liaise with senior staff, colleagues, nursery families and the wider local community.

Jack has made an immediate difference to a one-year-old child who started nursery in February. The child has already been in foster care and is now with their prospective adoptive parents, but suffers from huge separation anxiety. Jack has worked with them as a key person to settle them into nursery life and has helped support their mum during this difficult time. Thanks tohis work, the child is now settled into nursery and happily explores the activities on offer, interacting well with a range of staff.

He has also produced a simple, user-friendly, early childhood illness booklet for parents.

Jack’s confidence and belief in himself has grown tremendously since starting his apprenticeship and he is not only thriving in himself but is able to create an environment and activities where children can flourish.

At just 17, he is an incredibly valuable asset to the team and is helping himself, the setting and the wider community break down barriers of discrimination towards both males in the early years and disability in the workplace.

Jack’s manager says, ‘Jack is an asset to our nursery family and has been an excellent find. He has taken on additional training whilst doing his apprenticeship and is very keen to enhance and develop his knowledge. I could not ask for a better apprentice.’

FINALISTS

Claire Ratcliffe, The Lime Trees, Burton Joyce

Leanne Rowlands, Kids Planet Day Nurseries

Skye Stephens, Fit ‘N’ Fun Kids, Cornwall

CRITERION

Open to those undertaking an early years apprenticeship at any level, who show particular promise to be a star practitioner of the future.