As summer draws to a close we’d like to share some reflections on the work experience placements we had here at RDT during the school summer break.

Five students came to RDT HQ for work experience with us.  It was especially exciting for us that four of them were female, as we love to be able to encourage girls in tech zone.  The quality of our five visitors was particularly high this year, they were all incredibly capable and made a real impact on us.

The students who joined us were Chloie and Georgia, year 13s studying A-level computer science, year 11 student Samuel, and year 12s Emily and Zola, who are also both studying A-level computer science.

While there was a range of knowledge and experience among the students, they all knew Python, the general-purpose coding language that’s taught in schools.  However we introduced them to C# coding language and object-oriented programming, both of which are widely used in commercial software development.  All five were also very interested to learn about our use of Agile methodology.

Principle Software Engineer Rich Day said: ‘The GCSE and A-Level students we had over the summer all had exceptional ability.  By the end of their time with us they had all succeeded in completing a software development task normally set for university graduates.’

Agile Delivery Manager Lee Stewartson added: ‘It was a great experience coaching the students in the values and principles of agile here at RDT.  For me the highlight of their time here were the retrospectives, these were really insightful and gave the students key areas of focus to apply back at their places of study.’

All five students told us how they benefited from talking to the people at RDT who started out with us either on work experience, an internship, work placement or an apprenticeship.  This assured them that they would have the chance to return and work with us in the future.  They added that they had learned some very valuable lessons from the team at RDT, from software development to how to play pool in our breakout area!

RDT’s HR Director, Fiona Mason, said: ‘It’s great to see these young people advancing their skills independently.  This appetite for learning will absolutely benefit them in their future careers, and will be a real asset to their future employers – which will hopefully be RDT.’