DfT Aviation Skills Team / Reach for the Sky Programme
The aviation skills team are working to promote diversity and inclusion in the aviation sector, where there are significant diversity issues - by gender, age and other under-represented groups. For example, around 95% of pilots are male.
The team have set up the Reach of the Sky Programme - aimed to work with industry partners and other government departments to make the aviation industry diverse, inclusive and accessible to all. It is aimed at attracting under-represented groups, and particularly young people, to careers in aviation by addressing financial and wider social barriers and creating new opportunities in the sector.
The team have already established significant industry engagement groups and delivered an initial set of funding with outreach partners, that are already having a really positive impact on young people, women, and BAME groups, and their awareness and opportunities of careers in aviation and aerospace.
They have established a set of Aviation Ambassadors who are actively promoting this work and doing significant outreach activities, including with the programme team, CAA, outreach partners and industry. A recent success for the team was their outreach and participation in the.‘virtual’ Farnborough event in July 2020. The team also organised and event with the Ambassadors to celebrate International Women’s Day and encourage more women into the aviation sector and important STEM roles – they produced a video to highlight this work here: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=7x_neQ1TFmo&feature=youtu.be