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Inspirational Bentley engineer is award winner

9th December 2010 Print
Charlotte Gough

Bentley apprentice Charlotte Gough (20) has won the Mary George Memorial Prize for Apprentices 2010 awarded by the Institute of Engineering and Technology (IET) at a prestigious ceremony held in London yesterday evening.

The IET is the leading professional society which promotes the positive role of science, engineering and technology and has over 150, 000 members world-wide.   The award given to Charlotte honours the very best female apprentice engineers working in the UK today.  It highlights the achievements of women in engineering and encourages others to enter the profession. 

The ceremony was hosted by Liz Bonin, scientist and presenter of BBC’s Bang Goes the Theory and Charlotte was presented with an engraved trophy, a certificate and a cheque for £750 by guest of honour Lynne Featherstone MP.  Charlotte will now be invited to participate in high profile events throughout the year offering excellent networking opportunities and raising her profile within the engineering industry.  The other two short-listed candidates were given special merit awards to recognise the high quality of this year’s finalists.

Charlotte was selected by the judging panel as someone who goes beyond the normal duties of engineering.  Her contribution to school liaison activities and career fairs which inspire young people to pursue a career in engineering was highlighted.  She was judged on an autobiographical account of her training and experiences that she submitted to the IET as well as a video of her working in Bentley’s prototype workshop.

Charlotte, an auto-electrical apprentice was delighted to win the award, she explains “I knew from an early age that I wanted to work with cars and my apprenticeship at Bentley Motors has given me the opportunity to fulfil this passion – working on the development of fantastic products such as the Bentley Mulsanne and the New Continental GT has been a brilliant opportunity and winning this award is the icing on the cake.”  She finished her apprenticeship earlier this year and has recently started a foundation degree in electrical engineering whilst continuing to broaden her experiences within the Bentley engineering team.

Christine Gaskell, Member of the Board for Personnel at Bentley Motors said, “We are very proud of Charlotte’s achievement.  She is a remarkable young engineer and we are delighted that her skills, enthusiasm and dedication have been recognised by one of the UK’s leading professional engineering societies.  Recruiting engineering apprentices is key to Bentley’s success and we are fully supportive of the IET’s goal of encouraging others to take a similar career path to Charlotte.”

IET President, Dr. Nigel Burton commented, “These young women are leading lights in the engineering industry and their work and achievements will help encourage and inspire other women to view engineering as a suitable and worthwhile career choice. My sincere congratulations go to all the finalists, they are fantastic role models in an industry which is key to this country’s continued development.”

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Charlotte Gough