Incredible SSE Commitment Made to YGT Young People

Organisations throughout Glasgow are opening their doors to our young people. Offering phenomenal experiences that spark vital aspirations.

As well as providing a volunteer mentor for every care experienced young person in Glasgow, Young Glasgow Talent, by MCR Pathways, is completely committed to providing every single one with Talent Tasters. Building on the confidence a volunteer mentor instills, Talent Tasters allow our young people to explore industries, organisations and careers, working with inspiring employees along the way. Tasters and mentors are the vital components that help our city’s most disadvantaged young people find, grow and use their talents and skills.

Glasgow businesses, large and small now support YGT Young People. From Wheatley Group, to The Herald and from Marshall Brown Window Manufacturers to City Building, they’ve introduced our S3 and S4 young people to the working world. As well as getting our young people learning more about a field they’d like to work in, businesses also get the fantastic opportunity to meet the city’s future young talent!

Our recent Talent Taster was with energy company SSE. The Energy and Engineering Taster, held at SSE’s Waterloo Street offices, was an amazing opportunity for our young people to get hands-on experiences of working in a fantastic organisation.

Group interview sessions took place, showing young people the pathways they’ll follow to achieve a career here. Staff from various departments and levels of SSE were grilled by our young people as they explained more about the company and the apprenticeship scheme, encouraging our young Glaswegians into engineering.

This was followed by an interactive workshop where our young people worked with lighting circuits, copper wire and electrical wiring – a particular hit with our group! In the session, they wired a plug, did a manual dexterity test and wired an electrical circuit.

“I liked wiring the plug and working on the circuit board. It was really difficult at first, but Tony helped us to understand it and it made sense”

“I’d really like to be an electrical engineer. I liked bending the copper wire to try to make it the same as the picture. Real SSE engineers have to do that in their test to get a job”

“My favourite bit of the taster was asking Vic Stirling questions and getting to know more about SSE. Vic really inspired me to get an apprenticeship in the trades”


SSE’s Apprentice Development Officer, Tony Stirling, helped organise this incredible Taster.

Going above and beyond, Tony has also now registered as an MCR Pathways volunteer mentor. He’ll provide a consistent, supportive relationship to a very deserving young person.

Tony said “I was delighted to facilitate this fantastic event with MCR Pathways. I didn’t have the best time at school myself so I wanted to share my experience with these kids to reassure them that there’s choices out there and great opportunities in the energy industry. I joined SSE at a young age and worked my way up from there – I hope this Taster gave them a confidence boost and some new career ideas to take away.”

To inspire our young people even further, SSE made an incredible commitment to all of the Talent Taster attendees. They will offer our young people the opportunity to take the apprentice test as long as they show a genuine interest in working for SSE and they achieve high attendance at school.

What an incredible pledge to inspire even further our committed and determined young people!

Huge thanks to SSE for delivering such an inspiring Talent Taster and for motivating our incredible young people even further!

We have more young people signing up for Young Glasgow Talent’s help. They need mentors to make a huge difference to their confidence, educational outcomes and future life chances. Can you help them? Find out more about becoming a mentor.

Can your organisation help? To become involved in our Talent Taster programme, alongside our partners such as The Herald and SSE Get Involved

We’re always looking for new mentors to reach all the new young people who are coming on board with the programme. Help us spread the word by letting your friends and family know how worthwhile mentoring can be!

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