Business

Graduates flushed with success

Published 6 August 2010

Seven University of Brighton graduates have become the first to pass through the Southern Water Masters Excellence With Industry programme.

Six received their awards during graduation at the Dome: Andrew Abdulmasih, Tom Christy, Adrian Davies-Jordan, Ian Davis, Carl Gibson and Liam Green. The seventh, Sam Matthews, is currently travelling in central America. An eighth, Sam Wrightman, will graduate at a separate ceremony in February.

The group is the first to complete the two-year scheme which is run in partnership with the university and was voted People Initiative of the Year at this year's Water Industry Achievement Awards.

As well as a £9,000 bursary to pay for their studies, every graduate was offered a job by Southern Water or one of its suppliers that sponsor the scheme.

David Coleshill, Tom Christy, Ian Davis, Carl Gibson and Professor Julian Crampton

Left to right: Southern Water Learning and Development Manager David Coleshill, graduates Tom Christy, Ian Davis, Carl Gibson, and Professor Julian Crampton, the university's Vice-Chancellor.

The Masters programme offers degrees in project management, construction management, civil engineering, mechanical engineering and also digital electronics, computing and communications.

Its popularity shows no signs of slowing. A further eight people joined the programme last year and ten more were signed up this year.

Professor Andrew Lloyd, dean of the Faculty of Science and Engineering, said: "The programme, through a strong and effective partnership between the university, Southern Water and the other consortium partners, has provided a unique bridge between study and work allowing the students to transition more effectively from university to employment in the water industry.

"The high academic achievement of the students on this programme is a testament to the benefits of such programmes and the overall learning experience they offer."

David Coleshill, Southern Water's Learning and Development Manager, said: "Currently there is a real difficulty in the water industry of obtaining high quality engineering graduates.

"This programme has gone some way to filling that gap for Southern Water and its service providers.

"This first graduates are a bright bunch of people and their success is a credit to their hard work and to the teaching offered to them by the university."

Carl Gibson, from Brighton, said he "very much" enjoyed his mechanical engineering course and the final two years when he undertook placement work through the Southern Water scheme.

He said: "I worked in asset management and later on a site building a sewer relief well. People would be crazy to turn down an opportunity like this."

Ian Davis, from Welling in Kent, said he would urge others to join the programme.

He said: "I'd definitely recommend it. It was great for me to be able to work in the real working environment and with teams on real projects.

"It was equally great that I had the prospect of a job at the end of the programme and to be able to choose which company I wanted to work with and the kind of work I wanted to do."

The programme is sponsored by Southern Water and suppliers WS Atkins, BTU, Clancy Docwra, Costain, MWH and United Utilities.