Caledonia Apprentice on to a Winner at SFHA Conference

Recently two of Caledonia Housing Association’s modern apprentices, Stephanie McGowan and Rose Nicol, attended the 40^th anniversary conference for the Scottish Federation of Housing Associations (SFHA).

The event also included an Apprentice Challenge which saw 20 young people from the housing sector working on a task over the days of the event, which Stephanie and Rose both took part in.

Four teams of apprentices were asked to develop a communications strategy which could be implemented by a social landlord. The teams looked at four different topics – social isolation in older people, engaging with young people, energy efficiency and mental illness. Team four, which looked at engaging with young people, were crowned the winners. Team four included Matthew Wainman from Scottish Borders Housing Association, Lewis Ritchie from Care and Repair Edinburgh, Iona Wilson from ng homes and Stephanie McGowan from Caledonia.

Stephanie said, “The challenge really made me think outside the box. It was challenging but what placed us all in good stead was the fact that we are all young and we looked at places where we currently socialise, study and spend our time. It was easy once we got into the swing of things and easy to locate where young people hang out in order to promote and encourage them to join management boards. Social media is a great place to start and we all agreed that more events could be carried out in schools, colleges as well doing a local radio campaign.”

Regarding the overall experience of her apprenticeship, Stephanie said, “I chose to do the apprenticeship as I wanted to gain experience and get an SVQ in administration. I have really enjoyed meeting all my colleagues. In the future I would like to go to college to further my education and become a medic in the British Army.\"

Caledonia Housing Association run a yearly apprenticeship programme. Watch this space for our next intake.