The Oxfordshire County Council CHOICE awards are an opportunity to recognise and value the great work that colleagues do across the council. The winners of the directorate CHOICE awards attended a celebration event on 14 December where the overall corporate winners were announced. Oxfordshire Apprenticeships team member Charlotte Cox, who support the Economy and Skills team as an apprentice, won the Honesty award. 

Charlotte’s nomination said “Charlotte is currently doing a Level 4 Business Admin Apprenticeship with the Oxfordshire Apprenticeships team in Economy & Skills. She supports the team with all aspects of admin and much more besides! Charlotte joined the council in September 2013 as a Level 3 Business Admin Apprentice. Having completed that, she decided to continue learning at work, rather than just getting a job, by progressing into a Level 4 Apprenticeship with the council. This meant that she could continue developing her skills and learning new ones within the workplace. Charlotte is always keen to try new things and learn from more experienced colleagues. She will always ask for feedback about something she’s done that she’s not sure about and learns and improves constantly by listening to and taking on board suggestions from others. She’s not afraid to challenge where she thinks something could be done differently and better and her ideas and suggestions are highly valued within the team. We all rely so much on Charlotte and would trust her with anything!
Charlotte recently wrote an article about an away day that she attended for the Oxfordshire Apprenticeships website, which she admitted that she found hard as English was never her strong point and she found it difficult to get started. However, she persevered and wrote the article, including collecting and incorporating quotes from others. When I read it I was so impressed by what she had achieved that I immediately asked her to write another one about a different event! When I read Charlotte’s draft of the second article, I felt that there were a couple of areas for improvement, which I shared with Charlotte, who took the suggestions on board and updated the article. She wasn’t afraid to face the challenge and take on board the constructive criticism and her journalistic skills are emerging and flourishing as a result! The role of the Oxfordshire Apprenticeships team is to raise awareness of Apprenticeships with young people and their families and also employers. Charlotte’s role is to provide admin support for that, but she goes way beyond the extra mile in her work for the team. As well as supporting the team with the usual admin side of events – bookings, materials, handouts, slide shows etc, Charlotte actually comes along to the events and takes part herself – sharing her experience and knowledge to make a difference for the people attending the event".

Congratulations to Charlotte on the well deserved award.