Six students from Milton Keynes College are celebrating the completion of valuable internships taking in every aspect of life and work at the National House-Building Council’s (NHBC) HQ in Knowlhill.

It’s the second year of a partnership with the UK’s largest provider of new home warranty and insurance that last year saw several of the 16-19 year olds who took part ending up with fixed term or full-time jobs with the company. 

Gary Seymour-Griffiths,Work Placement Co-ordinator at the College says, “It’s a really successful and prestigious programme for our students to be involved with.  There are opportunities in Finance, Customer Services, Human Resources and Operations, and the young people involved are doing Business A Level or Construction T Level, so what they’re learning is completely relevant to their education.  NHBC looks after them really well and gives them a great grounding in their business, and they pay them properly too, significantly above the required level for their age.”

Those taking part had to go through a rigorous selection process with interviews at the College before getting as far as being interviewed by the company.  The students had the opportunity to go on site with NHBC Building Inspectors, deal directly with customer calls and work on projects of their own. 

Linda Elberts, Diversity, Equity & Inclusion Business Partner at NHBC says they’ve been really impressed by the quality of the young people taking part.  She says, “The candidates gave our interviewers a difficult job in choosing who to take, and they did themselves and MK College proud.  One interviewer said the quality of candidates was even better than last year, which they hadn’t thought possible.  Another said they wished they had more positions to offer because it was so hard to decide between them.”

The young people were celebrated for their achievements at a special event on Thursday 21 August where NHBC CEO, Steve Wood presented them with their completion certificates.  The interns then enjoyed a networking lunch with NHBC and MK College leaders to discuss future opportunities.

Speaking at the event, MK College student Umayrah Ali said: “My internship at NHBC has had a significant impact on how I see my future career. It’s made me realise that this is exactly the kind of work environment I want to be a part of, one that is welcoming, supportive, inclusive and genuinely people focused. The culture at NHBC has shown me how important it is to work somewhere that values collaboration, growth and respect. Environments like this don’t come around often and experiencing it firsthand has set a clear standard for what I’ll look for in my future workplace.”

NHBC’s Linda Elberts added: “As a local employer, NHBC is proud to partner with Milton Keynes College to provide the next generation with the skills and support they need to succeed in the workplace. NHBC employs more than 1,300 talented and dedicated people and has many recruitment opportunities.”

To find out more about how we work with employers, visit Employers – MK College