Dennis Eagle Launches 2026 EDT Industrial Cadets Programme with Coventry School
Dennis Eagle has kicked off its 2026 involvement in the EDT Industrial Cadets Gold programme, mentoring Year 12 students from Sydney Stringer Academy in Coventry on real-world engineering challenges.
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What Happened
Since 2011, the EDT Industrial Cadets scheme has offered students the chance to experience the world of work by participating in a STEM-related project from start to finish. Last year, the educational charity celebrated achieving 250,000 Industrial Cadets experiences, with an ambition to inspire one million young people to embrace jobs in industry by 2035. Dennis Eagle has supported the initiative for more than 10 years and this month officially began its 2026 Gold programme with a group of seven Year 12 students from Sydney Stringer Academy, including six female students.
Kick-off visit to Sydney Stringer Academy to present engineering challenges
Workshop day at a local university for prototyping resources
Submission of work
Project completion deadline
Final assessment by panel of judges and awards ceremony
“Taking part in the Industrial Cadets scheme not only offers local schools an important insight into how STEM skills are used within industry, but also provides us with an essential platform to really give back to the community. It’s no secret that there’s a significant skills shortage across the UK for STEM-related disciplines, so the opportunity to inspire the next generation of talent by getting”
In previous years, Dennis Eagle's involvement has yielded tangible results: in 2024, a team from Bablake School won the scheme's Project of the Year Award for designing a hydraulic cylinder lifting aid. The programme has also directly recruited talent; Sales Support Engineer Tess Jones participated as a student, later joined Dennis Eagle as an apprentice, and won Advanced Apprentice Graduate of the Year at the 2023 MGTS Awards.
Why this matters
The programme helps address the UK's STEM skills shortage by giving students hands-on project experience and exposure to careers in engineering, while Dennis Eagle gains potential future apprentices.
Terms in This Story
- EDT Industrial Cadets
- A UK educational scheme that provides students with real-world industry projects to develop skills in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM).
- STEM
- An acronym for Science, Technology, Engineering, and Mathematics, referring to related academic disciplines and careers.
- Apprentice
- A person who learns a trade through a combination of on-the-job training and study, often leading to a qualification.
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