Senior Apprenticeship & Widening Participation Co-ordinator in Sutton

NHS AfC: Band 5

Main area Administration Grade NHS AfC: Band 5 Contract Permanent Hours Full time - 37.5 hours per week Job ref 282-OD1898

Employer The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust Employer type NHS Site The Royal Marsden Sutton Town Sutton Salary £36,943 - £44,900 per annum Salary period Yearly Closing 05/10/2026 23:59 Interview date 20/10/2026

Job overview

We are looking for an exceptional Senior Apprenticeships and Widening Participation Co‑ordinator to join the team.
Experienced in either Learning & Development, apprenticeships, widening participation, or a similar people-focused environment, you’ll lead the delivery and coordination of a wide range of initiatives, including supporting our apprenticeship schemes, organising work placements, school engagement activities and career events.
The role involves offering learner support to both new and existing apprentices , supporting internal teams with apprenticeship recruitment and onboarding, and ensuring compliance with funding rules. Strong communication, coordination, and data management skills are essential, including experience with spreadsheets.
You will be engaging with individuals at all levels, clinical and non‑clinical, senior leaders and entry level students, so strong communication and stakeholder management skills are essential. You’ll need to be confident in influencing others and delivering a high standard of service to both internal and external stakeholders, as such, this role will suit someone who is highly organised, proactive and able to manage competing priorities.

Main duties of the job

This role is central to the delivery of the Trust's Apprenticeship and Widening Participation programme, which aims to broaden routes into healthcare and provide development opportunities and career pathways for existing staff.
The post holder will coordinate the Trust's widening participation activity, including the work experience programme, covering applications, pre‑placement checks, induction and evaluation, and supporting its ongoing development. You will develop and maintain relationships with schools and colleges, support the School Ambassador Network and create opportunities for local students to explore healthcare careers through careers events, school visits, talks and outreach.
You will also support T Levels, placements and other initiatives that create pathways from education into NHS careers.
You will support the delivery of the Trust’s apprenticeship strategy, coordinating events that celebrate and raise the profile of apprenticeships across the Trust. You will liaise with apprentices, line managers and apprenticeship providers, ensuring they are appropriately supported and that issues are resolved in a timely manner. You will also help connect widening participation activity with apprenticeship and early careers opportunities.The post holder will need to be adaptable and responsive to changing priorities and emerging opportunities in line with local and national policy.

Working for our organisation

The Royal Marsden NHS Foundation Trust is a world‑leading cancer centre. Our role is to offer our patients the best cancer care available anywhere in the world, and to continue to make a global contribution to finding better ways of diagnosing and treating cancer. We employ over 4,500 staff in a diverse range of careers including nursing, medical, science, radiography, pharmacy, occupational therapy, finance and administrative services. We have two hospitals – one in Chelsea, London, and one in Sutton, Surrey – as well as a Medical Daycare Unit in Kingston Hospital.

At The Royal Marsden, we deal with cancer every day, so we understand how valuable life is. When people entrust their lives to us, they have the right to demand the very best. That's why the pursuit of excellence lies at the heart of everything we do.

At the heart of the hospital is our dedicated team. We offer a stimulating and dynamic working environment, a wide range of staff benefits, learning and development opportunities and clear career pathways. There are opportunities to work flexibly across a range of areas and specialities and we welcome flexible working requests from point of hire to support employees work life balance. We are looking for employees who aspire to excellence, share our values and can play a crucial role in our on‑going achievements.

Detailed job description and main responsibilities

For further information, please refer to the detailed Job Description & Person Specification:

Apprenticeships

• Provide advice and support to recruiting managers interested in recruiting a new apprentice starter, including advising on appropriate providers, supporting the advertising and shortlisting processes and liaising with recruitment to co‑coordinate employment start dates with course enrolment.
• Build and maintain effective working relationships with managers, apprentices, training providers and external partners to ensure a coordinated approach to programme delivery.
• Support apprentices, providing guidance throughout their programme and acting as a key point of contact between the apprentice, line manager and training provider, ensuring queries are addressed and appropriate support is in place.
• Maintain oversight of learner progress, proactively monitoring end‑point assessment and completion dates, ensuring timely completion and accurate recording of grades and outcomes for reporting and quality monitoring.
• Be proactive in ensuring the Learning Hub is kept up to date, and all apprenticeships content
  is current and relevant.

Widening Participation

• Coordinate the Trust’s Work Experience Programme, including applications, pre‑placement checks, induction and workshops.
• Advise, guide and actively support managers on the structure and content of the placements and the preparation, monitoring and evaluation of work experience placements.
• Act as the Trust’s main point of contact for work experience with local schools and colleges, building and maintaining relationships to coordinate placements, share information and resolve issues.
• Continue to build engagement with clinical and non‑clinical managers to increase the number of areas welcome to hosting work experience placements across the Trust.
• Continuously improve processes for work experience with the aim of improving the experience and outcomes for placement hosts and students.

Person specification

Education/Qualifications

• Education to degree level, or equivalent qualification or relevant comparable experience.
• Holds a relevant qualification in Learning and Development, CIPD or equivalent.

Experience

• Experience of working in HR/Learning and Development or a similar people‑focused role.
• Experience of supporting apprenticeship programmes and/or experience of working in early careers, widening participation, employability, education, youth employment or comparable.
• Experience of coordinating complex administrative processes involving multiple stakeholders, managing shared mailboxes and responding to high volumes of enquiries.
• Experience of maintaining accurate records and confidently using spreadsheets, databases and data tracking systems.
• Ability and initiative to prioritise a busy workload.
• Experience of organising meetings, monitoring actions and managing competing deadlines.
• Experience of providing advice to stakeholders at all levels including senior managers.
• Experience of influencing and persuading others in a work context.
• Experience of engaging entry‑level talent, such as supporting pathways into education, training or employment through outreach, work experience, careers activity, apprenticeships or similar.
• Demonstrated ability to work with internal stakeholders to secure support for placements, apprenticeships, early careers and widening participation activity, or comparable experience.
• Experience in organising widening participation initiatives such as schools’ engagement or attending careers fairs.

Skills/Abilities/knowledge

• Excellent written and verbal communication skills, with the ability to produce high‑quality documents.
• A solid understanding of the rules and requirements of the Growth and Skills levy.
• Competent in the use of Microsoft Office applications.
• Excellent interpersonal skills, with the ability to influence and build positive working relationships with stakeholders.
• Excellent organisational, coordination and planning skills, whilst managing competing demands.
• Ability to work without close supervision and organise, anticipate and plan workload.
• Ability to work flexibly, use initiative and respond effectively to problems as they arise.

The Royal Marsden values diversity and is committed to the recruitment and retention of underrepresented minority groups. We particularly welcome applications from Black, Asian and minority ethnic candidates, LGBTQ+ candidates and candidates with disabilities.

As a Disability Confident Employer, we are working to create a workplace that enables all staff to reach their full potential. We are committed to this because we know that greater diversity and inclusion will lead to an even greater positive impact for the people we serve.

Due to the high volumes of applications we receive, we reserve the right to close any adverts before the published closing date once we have received a sufficient number of applications. We advise you to submit your application as early as possible to prevent disappointment. Please ensure your information is accurate to avoid errors with processing your application

All applicants will be contacted by email to the address supplied on your application. Applicants are advised to check their email accounts regularly and to ensure that email filters are set to allow our emails.

Flu Vaccination – What We Expect of our Staff

At The Royal Marsden we have an immune compromised patient population who we must protect as much as we can against the flu virus. Each year, seasonal flu affects thousands of people in the UK. Occurring mainly in winter, it is an infectious respiratory disease capable of producing symptoms ranging from those similar to a common cold, through to very severe or even fatal disease.

The wellbeing of our staff and patients is of the upmost importance to us, and it is the expectation of The Royal Marsden that all patient‑facing staff have an annual flu vaccination, provided free of charge by the Trust.

Employer certification / accreditation badges

Name Natalie Taylor Job title Head of Apprenticeships and Widening participation Email address natalie.taylor2@rmh.nhs.uk

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