Apprentices and their employers from across Leeds are taking part in a virtual careers panel event this week, as part of Leeds #Manufacturing Festival. The event will showcase to an audience of young people the wide range of apprenticeships available in the city’s manufacturing industry, which employs almost 30,000 people across more than 1,600 businesses in Leeds. Students from the city’s Mount St Mary’s High School will take part in the live event on 28 January, with a free recording available for schools and colleges to use in National Apprenticeship Week, from 8-14 February.

Organisers of the Leeds Manufacturing Festival, launched this month to showcase the 1,600 manufacturing businesses in the city as a positive career choice for young people, have announced the line-up of sponsors backing this year’s initiative.

The Leeds Manufacturing Festival launches next week with a programme of online events designed to connect young people at schools and colleges across the city with some of Leeds’ most innovative and inspiring manufacturing businesses.

Odyssey Collaborative Trust, which runs six primary schools in Derby, has won bids to secure £2.5m of funding to carry put major improvement works to school buildings under the Government’s Condition Improvement Fund (CIF) programme. Beaufort, Asterdale and Cherry Tree Hill schools will all undergo re-roofing projects under the scheme, while Springfield School will have new windows installed and Asterdale School will also receive a new boiler.

Property consultant @Eddisons has secured £30m to improve buildings at 76 academy schools across the UK under the Government’s Condition Improvement Fund (CIF) programme.