Speed Mentoring: Work Placements

Students meet organisations at a ‘speed mentoring event’, where they can discuss their course and career aspirations, and find out as much information they can about the practices before attending their work placement.

The programme has been running for nine years and is exceptionally popular with both students and practices. This year, thirteen regional practices engaged with the programme offering placements to eighteen BA (Hons) Architecture students. 

The event provides an excellent opportunity for the students to gain insightful knowledge about practices and build connections that could enhance their careers. The work placements are a great way of bridging the gap between study and employment and helping students see where their learning can be applied in real-life work situations. 

Dr Simon Warren, BA (Hons) Architecture senior lecturer, said,

"This extracurricular programme provides students with a week of practical experience with a Leeds city region practice. Speed mentoring, which refers to how matches are made between students and practices at the introductory event, has become embedded as a key event in the academic year. 

Work placements are important in developing practice ready skills and confidence. The students learn a lot within a short amount of time. They also can lead to full-time positions once students have graduated.”

Karina Orizarova, an Architecture student is taking part in the programme said, 

“My placement at DLA ended this week with a presentation of my final proposals for my intervention for the site I was working on. I had a lot of fun doing this project, developing my CAD skills and learning about the many Building Regulations which we must comply with.

I had an exclusive opportunity to visit the Majestic, Channel 4 building in Leeds City centre. It is a beautiful building filled with many architectural details linking back to its original cinema use. 

It has been a great week at DLA Architecture, I have learnt so much from the amazing team. I hope I get a chance to work with them again in the future.”

The practices are very generous and allow students to dive in and work with them for a week to see how architecture is produced in the real world. Architect Bradley Spencer from P+HS Architects attended the Speed Mentoring introductory session and spoke to students about their work. Bradley said, 

"It was a really interesting exercise and the students were fantastic. We were particularly pleased to find a match and offer a work placement to Adil Akhtar.

Adil spent five days with us, working on design challenges set from a live healthcare project. At the end of the week, Adil presented his work back to staff in the Leeds office. We were all delighted with the enthusiasm and rigour applied to working with us during the week and equally delighted with the homemade cake he brought in on Friday."

The feedback received from students and practices about the programme is always extremely positive.

Thank you to all the architectural practices who took part this year:

GWP Architecture
The Harris Partnership
CRL Architects
DLA Architecture
Mesh Architects
Bauman Lyons Architects
SSA Architects
Watson Batty Architects
Halliday Clark Architects
Bowman Riley Architects
P+HS Architects
KPP Architects 
Southgate and Sarabia Architects