Graduation ceremonies were recently held for the latest group of CLAAS apprentices to complete their four-year studies at Barony College in Scotland and at Saxham for the students from Reaseheath College in Cheshire.

The graduation ceremony at Barony marked the completion of the course for the first group of students to start at the college four years ago. Their achievement was witnessed by their friends, family and CLAAS and dealer representatives, together with the most recently recruited apprentices who joined the Scheme in August and will continue in the footsteps of the graduates.

CLAAS is still the only major land based manufacturer to offer a specific apprenticeship course based in both Scotland and England. Demand for the course in Scotland has been consistently evident not only from CLAAS dealers in Scotland and Northern England, but now also in Ireland, and runs in parallel with the course based at Reaseheath College

This year, a total of 21 students are joining the CLAAS Apprenticeship Scheme. Over the four years they attend Reaseheath or Barony, they will work towards a National Diploma in Land Based Technology, plus they will gain advanced technical and industry certificates that have been introduced by CLAAS.

These elements are all focused at a practical level which is applied through the students’ dealerships by ongoing workshop and field experience. In addition to this, the Apprentices also have exposure at the CLAAS headquarters in Harsewinkel, Germany and at the CLAAS UK headquarters at Bury St. Edmunds, Suffolk so that they are able to get a feel for the size and scale of the global business and the importance which CLAAS places on the development of competent technicians.

The CLAAS Apprenticeship Scheme is just the start of a planned training and development programme, designed by CLAAS to provide highly trained service personnel that meet the expectations of customers and have the specialist skills to work on modern, highly technical agricultural machinery.

Throughout their time within the CLAAS dealer network, the training and development pathways available to young technicians are progressive and aligned with the Landbased Technician Accreditation (LTA) Scheme. This sees the apprentices enrolled at LTA 1 at the start of the Apprentice programme and then upon graduation they become eligible for LTA 2 (Service Engineer). Subsequent dealer experience and CLAAS training can see them achieve LTA 3 (Master Mechanic) or even LTA 4 (Master Technician) status.

CLAAS has been at the forefront of the development of the LTA scheme which aims to set a universal standard by which the skill of a technician can be benchmarked, assessed and validated. CLAAS currently has around 350 staff registered across the board, with 32 registered at the highest level (LTA 4), which is more than any other manufacturer. This commitment to personal development from Apprentice (LTA 1) right up to Master Technician (LTA 4) reflects the importance that CLAAS places in ongoing training and the tangible benefits it brings to levels of customer service and satisfaction; a key barometer for any business which is as successful as CLAAS.