Liz Wise - Apprentice Analyst and Programmer
Liz Wise - Apprentice Analyst and Programmer at Staffordshire County Council
We’ve spoken to people from across the region who are currently completing, or who have completed, an apprenticeship so you can find out more about the opportunities available.
Liz is an Apprentice Analyst and Programmer at Staffordshire County Council. Liz has recently started a Level 4 apprenticeship that will take two years to complete, with the programme delivered by the online training provider Baltic Apprenticeships.
Read on to find out more about why they chose the apprenticeship route, what they enjoyed the most and more importantly, how it can help you in your career!
Why did you choose the apprenticeship route?
I’m Liz and I’m giddy with excitement about my new apprenticeship. I’m really enjoying being back in the workplace and in a fascinating field of IT. I’m 38 and I’ve been educating my daughter at home for the last 16 years. I’d been wondering about doing a Master’s degree course and doing lots of research into various field of IT, then I spotted this opportunity on Staffordshire County Council’s website, so I applied. I’m four months into it.
I’m part of a data warehouse team who manage the council’s information and provide that data in a format that our colleagues need. This could be for our insights team, for finance, social care or education, or any of the other services we provide. We are a ‘behind the scenes’ service, working to support officers in the ‘front line’. Everyone relies on IT these days so we need to work well, to make the council work well - for the benefit of local residents.
How has your apprenticeship helped you in your career?
My Baltic coach brings other people doing my course together on an online learning platform, the next two sessions are on data analysis concepts. I’ll be spending my time completing projects to evidence my learning, including real projects at work, which I think is a great way of learning on the job.
I see or speak to my council mentors daily. I’m usually working from home, so we often speak on Teams, but once a week or so I book a desk in the office. My two mentors give me role specific training, on top of what my coach at Baltic sets out for me. Working in such a technical field I do need to be kept up to date. My degree is in linguistics and phonetics but it’s the programming language SQL that I’ve most recently been learning.
My ambition is to continue learning about data engineering. I’d love to progress to a level 7 apprenticeship, a Master’s level, to find out more about machine learning and AI. I already use Chat GPT that helps me learn and solve issues; it’s like an extra teacher. It’d be amazing to find out more.
You can find out more about the roles Staffordshire County Council have available, and more information about them as an employer on their hub here!
