Student nurses' roadshow helps recruit new starters

Students Darby and Lucy, with their tutor Louise Frosdick who have been on the Apollo Roadshow, inspiring people to train for work in the health and care sector across Norfolk and Suffolk

Student nurses have been offering blood pressure and BMI tests on a roadshow aimed at recruiting more people to the care industry.

Apollo Health and Social Care is a two-year NHS-funded project working with the James Paget University Hospital in Gorleston, Norfolk, and colleges across the county and in Suffolk.

A roadshow has seen health professionals and students visit Ipswich and Bury St Edmunds in Suffolk, and King's Lynn, Norwich and Great Yarmouth, all in Norfolk.

The project has been designed to help recruit more people into the care sector, at all levels, and to encourage college and university training.

Darby and Lucy, both 17, live in Great Yarmouth and are both studying T-level heath at East Coast College.

Darby wants to be a paediatric nurse and hopes to go to university in 2025.

"My sister is a nurse and a lot of my family are in the care industry, so I've grown up around it.

"Year one was a lot more theory-based but now I am in year two there's a lot more practical stuff.

"Halfway through year one, three of us got jobs in care homes, so that's helped with all the practical stuff and we go on placements in the James Paget Hospital, so that helps us get all the knowledge we need to know."

Lucy, who is studying hoping to become a midwife, said: "A lot of people in my family have been around the care industry so, it's helped me a lot.

"We've been helping with community projects."

Debbie Sampson, from the James Paget University Hospital

Debbie Sampson works on recruitment and retention at the James Paget University Hospital.

She said not all employers have the ability to train new recruits to the required standards.

"There's such a high standard that is required to get these positions, but we are here to help support anyone and help them with their recruitment process.

"Any experience they have, whether care homes or other settings, all helps.

"They just need to know when they apply to put all their experience on their application and really sell themselves.

"There are jobs out there but there are so many applicants - it's hard for them to choose who to interview."

Sonia Loveday, the deputy project leader of Apollo Health and Social Care, says the roadshow across Norfolk and Suffolk has been a success

The project has involved East Coast College in Lowestoft and Great Yarmouth, East Norfolk Sixth Form College in Gorleston, City College Norwich, Suffolk New College in Ipswich, West Suffolk College in Bury St Edmunds and College of West Anglia in King's Lynn.

Sonia Loveday, the deputy project leader, said there had been a good response to the roadshow and they hoped to recruit more people to courses as a result.

"It's been really successful spreading the word, talking about Apollo and the health and social care sector," she said.

"It's raising awareness of the sector and getting more people into it and supporting retention within the sector."

Louise Frosdick, from East Coast College, says a new nursing training faculty in the heart of Great Yarmouth will help many students to their next level of training and qualification

Louise Frosdick, a T-level healthcare tutor at East Coast College, said it was hoped their work would encourage people to get into training, leading to jobs in the care industry at all levels.

From January, the college will open a nursing training faculty in Great Yarmouth town centre at The Place, the former Palmers department store which is undergoing a £17m transformation into a learning campus and public library.

She said: "It will be part of our higher education campus for Great Yarmouth, so some of our students could go onto courses there.

"Some are already starting to look at university places and are filling out their applications and for apprenticeships.

"It's about recruiting people into it earlier, getting people in and getting that engagement from the off, which these students get because they go out into clinical settings, so it's really good."