Sports Development Apprentice (Bridgwater College)
UCS College Group
Somerset (TA6 4PZ)
Closes in 14 days (Tuesday 30 September 2025 at 11:59pm)
Posted on 16 September 2025
Contents
Summary
You will be responsible for supporting the college’s Sports Development Team in a wide variety capacity. The post holder will be integral to supporting the commercial developments of the sports facilities, being a key contact for customers.
- Wage
-
£14,526.20 for your first year, then could increase depending on your age
National Minimum Wage rate for apprentices
Check minimum wage rates (opens in new tab)
Competitive salaries, defined benefits pension (Teachers’ or Local Government, role dependent), UCS College Group Extra retail & leisure discounts, plus an NUS Totum Discount Card.
- Training course
- Sports coach (level 4)
- Hours
-
Full time, 7am to 3:30pm Monday – Thursday, 7am to 3pm Friday. This role requires flexibility, with early mornings, late finishes, and occasional weekend duties to support sporting activities as needed.
37 hours a week
- Start date
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Tuesday 28 October 2025
- Duration
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1 year 6 months
- Positions available
-
1
Work
Most of your apprenticeship is spent working. You’ll learn on the job by getting hands-on experience.
What you'll do at work
Sports Commercial & Operations
- Take a proactive lead with leisure staff, apprentices, and volunteers alongside the Sports Development Manager to ensure effective facility operations.
- Oversee the opening/closing of gyms and leisure facilities, ensuring smooth handovers and accessibility.
- Manage day-to-day operations of the Sports Centre/Fitness Zone, delegating cleaning, maintenance, and customer service tasks.
- Lead on sustaining and growing commercial customers and maximise income through business plans and bookings outside core hours.
- Monitor payment processes (card, invoice, cash) and report financial data.
- Oversee equipment maintenance, risk assessments, and records in line with College policies.
- Manage external servicing/maintenance relationships.
- Lead the organisation of half-term activity camps, ensuring high-quality delivery.
- Carry out additional operational/strategic duties as directed.
Coaching & Sports Development
- Plan, prepare, and deliver high-quality sessions supporting the College’s health and wellbeing agenda.
- Support delivery of Team UCS CG Sport (Basketball, Netball, Trampolining etc).
- Coordinate school programmes and create new projects aligned with community needs and strategy.
- Contribute to the College Group’s sport and physical activity vision.
- Mentor student volunteers, activators, and apprentices.
- Oversee health, fitness, and recreational sessions while retaining some direct delivery.
- Promote innovation and continuous learning in student sport and education.
- Liaise with academic staff to support learner achievement.
- Lead or support the organisation of major sporting events, development days, charity events, and fundraising.
- Deliver Team UCS Development Days/Pathways to drive recruitment and progression for FE and HE Sport.
- Support College partnership clubs and maintain external links.
- Represent the College in regional/national networks (AoC Sport, SASP, ECFA) to raise profile.
- Work with schools across the South-West to identify talented performers and strengthen pathways into UCS College Group.
Contribution to Department & Area Team
- Play an active role in team meetings, departmental reporting, and planning, including Self-Assessment, Operating Plans, Ofsted readiness, and Sport Strategy.
- Contribute to marketing and recruitment (open evenings, school visits, tasters, publications).
Continuous Professional Development (CPD)
- Undertake CPD, maintain a Professional Development Portfolio, and evidence impact on practice.
- Engage in performance management, supporting personal and team development.
Other Responsibilities
- Support staff recruitment and mentoring of new staff/apprentices.
- Work with employers and stakeholders to deliver high-quality curriculum and enrichment.
- Contribute to the College’s strategic and operating plans.
- Ensure safeguarding, equality, diversity, and health & safety policies are embedded.
- Undertake additional duties as required by the Sports Development Manager or leadership.
Where you'll work
Bridgwater Centre
Bath Road
Bridgwater
Somerset
TA6 4PZ
Training
Apprenticeships include time away from working for specialist training. You’ll study to gain professional knowledge and skills.
Training provider
BRIDGWATER AND TAUNTON COLLEGE
Training course
Sports coach (level 4)
Understanding apprenticeship levels (opens in new tab)
What you'll learn
Course contents
- Influence key stakeholders in the sporting context through own coaching philosophy and professional practice.
- Enhance coaching competencies and inter-intra-personal skills through continued professional development and self-awareness skills training.
- Develop transformational coaching strategies and tactics that consider sector, sport, organisation and participants unique needs.
- Comply with legal, ethical, effective and efficient coaching systems that align to the organisational vision, strategies, policies and processes.
- Promote the value of the coaching team considering workforce structures and scopes including support staff, coaches, coaching assistants, and volunteers.
- Facilitate the development of the coaching team through due diligence, inductions, development and performance monitoring.
- Deliver effective coaching services through industry support networks and a collaborative, cohesive and competent coaching team.
- Design high quality curriculum that considers participants’ unique profiles, promotes ownership and informs micro, meso and macro plans as relevant to the sporting context.
- Designs and delivers progressive programmes and selects coaching pedagogies that maximise engagement, whole child/person development and accelerates sustainable skill acquisition.
- Delivers safe and effective coaching support to participants in practice, at events or competitions and influences learning and skill transfer across situations.
- Embrace each participants uniqueness, their rights and advocates fairness, equality and diversity within the coaching environment.
- Promote holistic wellbeing to control/contain stressors experienced by participants in their own context and environment.
- Facilitate participant development by applying learning theory and skill acquisition techniques relevant to participants needs, sport specific demands and context.
- Facilitate participant development and skill acquisition through positive learning environments and behaviour management strategies.
- Facilitate participant development and skill acquisition through technological advancements and wider industry support mechanisms.
- Measure the impact of the coaching strategies though analysis of participant, coach, coaching team and organisational perception and performance data.
- Proactively responds to global trends, strategies, and contemporary issues in high performance sport to ensure best practice in coaching.
- Embrace the high-performance context, culture, organisational direction, and codes to deliver effective coaching processes.
- Profile athletes or players to measure bio-psycho-social attributes and inform whole person optimisation.
- Profile athlete/players to measure sport specific technical and tactical attributes and inform sustainable development and high-performance goals.
- Plan sessions that consider high performance athlete's/player's unique needs, goals, curriculum, progressive programmes, practice, and competition schedules.
- Prepare for sessions by organising resources, conducting event risk assessment and ensures safe operating procedures in line with high performance sport policy.
- Deliver safe, inclusive sessions and makes adaptations in the moment to accelerate development and maximise performance gains through relevant coaching and communication methods.
- Evaluate sessions to monitor sustainability of athlete/player development and performance gains to shape future plans as part of the continuous enquiry cycle.
- Measure the impact of the coaching practice on the national and international positioning of the sport by comparing athlete or player results against national and international benchmarks.
- Proactively responds to sector strategies, social change agendas, national and local trends in physical activity participation and contemporary influences.
- Embrace the community category, context, culture, codes, stakeholders and public sector duty to deliver effective coaching pedagogies and processes.
- Profile participants to measure whole child/person development dimensions considering cognitive, social, emotional and physiological capabilities.
- Profile participants motives, behavioural norms, psychomotor skills, technical and tactical awareness in community sport and physical activity contexts to enable goals to be agreed.
- Plan targeted and accessible sessions that consider each participant's unique motives, development needs, goals and seasonal plans.
- Prepare for sessions by organising resources, conducting event risk assessment and ensures safe operating procedures in line with community organisation health and safety policy.
- Deliver safe and inclusive and effective sessions and makes adaptations in the moment to engage and enrich participants though tailored coaching and targeted communication methods for maximum impact.
- Evaluate sessions to monitor engagement, enrichment and whole child/person development dimensions to shape future plans as part of the continuous enquiry cycle.
- Measure the impact of coaching practice on social change associated with access, participation, performance, equality and wellbeing by comparing results against local and national benchmarks.
- Proactively responds to national trends in education standards, paradigm shifts, strategies and contemporary influences in school and physical education.
- Embrace the school category, context, culture, codes, stakeholders, and statutory guidelines to deliver effective coaching pedagogies and processes.
- Profile whole child development dimensions considering cognitive, social, emotional and physiological stages of development.
- Profile children's psychomotor, technical and tactical skills in physical activity contexts drawn from the DfE National Curriculum to enable physical education targets to be agreed.
- Plan safe, inclusive and effective sessions that consider each child's unique development needs, educational targets and curriculum plans.
- Prepare for sessions by organising resources, conducting event risk assessment and ensures safe operating procedures in line with school health and safety policy.
- Delivers safe, inclusive and effective sessions and makes necessary adaptations to develop children’s psychomotor skill mastery though tailored coaching and communication methods for maximum impact.
- Evaluate sessions to monitor children's mastery of physical education standards, psychomotor skills and whole child development to shape plans as part of the continuous enquiry cycle.
- Measure and evaluates the impact of coaching practice on school standards by comparing children's results against local and national benchmarks.
- Influence key stakeholders in the sporting context through own coaching philosophy and professional practice.
- Enhance coaching competencies and inter-intra-personal skills through continued professional development and self-awareness skills training.
- Develop transformational coaching strategies and tactics that consider sector, sport, organisation and participants unique needs.
- Comply with legal, ethical, effective and efficient coaching systems that align to the organisational vision, strategies, policies and processes.
- Promote the value of the coaching team considering workforce structures and scopes including support staff, coaches, coaching assistants, and volunteers.
- Facilitate the development of the coaching team through due diligence, inductions, development and performance monitoring.
- Deliver effective coaching services through industry support networks and a collaborative, cohesive and competent coaching team.
- Design high quality curriculum that considers participants’ unique profiles, promotes ownership and informs micro, meso and macro plans as relevant to the sporting context.
- Designs and delivers progressive programmes and selects coaching pedagogies that maximise engagement, whole child/person development and accelerates sustainable skill acquisition.
- Delivers safe and effective coaching support to participants in practice, at events or competitions and influences learning and skill transfer across situations.
- Embrace each participants uniqueness, their rights and advocates fairness, equality and diversity within the coaching environment.
- Promote holistic wellbeing to control/contain stressors experienced by participants in their own context and environment.
- Facilitate participant development by applying learning theory and skill acquisition techniques relevant to participants needs, sport specific demands and context.
- Facilitate participant development and skill acquisition through positive learning environments and behaviour management strategies.
- Facilitate participant development and skill acquisition through technological advancements and wider industry support mechanisms.
- Measure the impact of the coaching strategies though analysis of participant, coach, coaching team and organisational perception and performance data.
Training schedule
Requirements
Essential qualifications
GCSE in:
- English (grade 4)
- Maths (grade 4)
Desirable qualifications
Other in:
Share if you have other relevant qualifications and industry experience. The apprenticeship can be adjusted to reflect what you already know.
Skills
- Communication skills
- Organisation skills
- Customer care skills
- Team working
- Non judgemental
- Physical fitness
- Flexibility
Other requirements
If a job offer is made you will be asked to apply for a DBS Disclosure Certificate. The Disclosure Certificate will contain details of current and “spent” convictions, cautions, reprimands or warnings held on the Police National Computer, excluding certain specified old and minor offences.
About this employer
We envision a future where every learner, regardless of their starting point, has access to world-class education and training that opens doors to meaningful careers and fulfilling lives. Through our collective strength and individual expertise, we will drive economic growth, foster innovation, and create lasting positive impact across Somerset and beyond.
https://www.ucscollegegroup.ac.uk (opens in new tab)
Company benefits
Generous leave, career breaks, childcare discount, STAR awards, long service recognition, wellbeing support, gym & cycle schemes, counselling, eye care, Microsoft Office, plus leisure discounts at Cannington facilities.
After this apprenticeship
On successful completion of the apprenticeship, there may be an opportunity to progress into full-time employment with us.
Ask a question
The contact for this apprenticeship is:
BRIDGWATER AND TAUNTON COLLEGE
The reference code for this apprenticeship is VAC1000342278.
Apply now
Closes in 14 days (Tuesday 30 September 2025 at 11:59pm)
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