City of Newport Campus students proved they have a head for figures when they won Wales’ first ever skills competition in Accountancy last month.
Two teams of three from the Campus, who are all working towards the AAT (Association of Accounting Technicians) Intermediate qualification, competed against 27 other accounting students from across Wales at the competition at Swansea College.
The teams put their accountancy skills to the test in challenges that an accounting technician would face in the course of a ‘regular day at the office’ such as preparing reports, purchase ledgers and balances and well as demonstrating their team working, communication and organisation skills. Each team was allocated a laptop with the accounts on, a notebook and calculator so working together as a team was vital if they were to complete the challenge in its entirety.
The winning team for Coleg Gwent, Lucinda Murphy, Dave Sadler and Joshua Broom, all won £50 each plus a one day work placement at PriceWaterhouse Coopers in Cardiff Bay.
32-year-old Dave Sadler from Cardiff was really please with the victory: “The competition was challenging and good fun – I was surprised at the diversity of the competitors and also that we did so well. Although we worked very well as a group, all of us felt that we could perhaps have done a little better with the final work we presented if we’d had a little more time. Our team tried to focus on working through separate tasks but ended up going through everything together after a while. I suppose this helped our accuracy and meant that we learned a lot from each other as well as the experience of taking part in this event. I am looking forward to seeing the PWC office and getting a real feel for how our new knowledge could be put into practice.”
Coleg Gwent’s other team, who received high praise from the judges, were Mohammad Shokur Abdul, Phil Swainston and Donna Lydford
Also taking part were learners from Swansea College, Gorseinon College, Coleg Gwent, Bridgend College, Coleg Llandrillo Cymru and Pembrokeshire College.
The teams’ tutor Caroline Carr s really proud of all of the students involved: “They acted professionally and with decorum throughout and were excellent ambassadors for the college and themselves. The judges commented that the level of team work, support and fun coming from the Coleg Gwent teams was very high and a pleasure to witness.”
