Digital Engineering Technology and Innovation (DETI) - Skills Development

About DETI

The West of England is a hub for innovative Science, Technology, Engineering and Mathematics (STEM) industries, and home to a thriving ecosystem of digital creatives and future arts industries. However, as with the rest of the UK, there is a huge skills and employment gap for future engineers. That’s why the new Digital Engineering Technology and Innovation (DETI) initiative is investing in the future of digital engineering for our region. 

DETI is a strategic programme of the West of England Combined Authority (WECA), delivered by the National Composites Centre, in partnership with the Centre for Modelling and Simulation (CFMS), Digital Catapult, UWE Bristol, University of Bristol, and University of Bath.

Industry partners include Airbus, GKN Aerospace, Rolls-Royce, and CFMS, with in kind contributions from UWE Bristol, Digital Catapult and Siemens. DETI is funded by £5 million from WECA, with co-investment from the High Value Manufacturing Catapult and industry.

DETI - Skills Development

UWE Bristol is leading the Skills Development programme for DETI, establishing an engineering engagement hub for the West of England, based out of our new state-of-the-art School of Engineering building. Working in collaboration with key DETI partners and industry supporters, they are delivering three programmes.

Inspire

Encouraging diversity and inclusivity, DETI Inspire engages children in primary and secondary education across the West of England, with a focus on disadvantaged areas. Using curriculum-linked engineering outreach and careers support, we are connecting children with real-life, diverse engineering role models to widen participation and aspirations for STEM careers.

The Inspire programme is led by Dr Laura Fogg-Rogers, Senior Lecturer and Researcher at UWE Bristol, with support from Graphic Science, the STEM Ambassador hub of the West of England, and in collaboration with the Wessex Inspiration Network and Future Quest, leaders for Higher Education outreach into secondary schools of the region.

DETI Inspire builds on the success of previous projects founded and launched by UWE Bristol, including Curiosity Connections – the network for inspirational primary STEM education in the West of England, and Women Like Me – a tiered mentoring project for women engineers, and has established the DETI Diversity Demonstrator – a network of high-quality diverse engineering career role models, supported by Inspire to interact with outreach events throughout the West of England.

Transform

Inspiring future generations, the DETI Transform programme plans to engage with further and higher education institutions to map and upgrade current taught provision and demonstrate how digital engineering can contribute to the sustainability goals for the West of England, leading into the next phase of clean and sustainable growth. 

Innovate

To ensure the current and future workforce is digital ready, the DETI Innovate programme will examine the tools, technologies, and processes needed to rapidly accelerate engineering capabilities and identify the skills needed to embed a digital culture throughout organisations in the West of England. By undertaking a Skills Gap Analysis, DETI Innovate will map current roles within the design and manufacturing fields to digital skills, both current and future, to understand the gaps and help focus solutions.

Working with the existing engineering community, DETI Innovate will ensure courses are ‘fit for purpose’ to build the workforce of the future. Working with established national and regional initiatives, short courses will be developed to enhance digital awareness, and a postgraduate conversion course for technical and non-technical graduates will equip them with the necessary digital skills to fulfil roles in a digital manufacturing workplace.

For more information about our DETI Skills programme, contact deti@uwe.ac.uk.

Additional information

For more information about DETI, you can visit the DETI website or sign up to the DETI newsletter. 

You can also read about our progress on the Engineering Our Future blog.