TEKGEM VISIT

Our Year 13 Computer Science students were recently able to find out more about cyber security apprenticeships through local company Tekgem, as a possible pathway for them after their studies here at Durham Sixth Form Centre.

Tekgem is an industrial cyber security company, bridging the gap between information technology and operational technology. Whilst its headquarters are located at NETPark in Sedgefield, the company works across the UK and abroad to provide specialist industrial cyber security products and services to those organisations. 

Garry Fairhurst, Tekgem’s Operations Director, began by giving an overview of the company before introducing members of his team, including former Durham Sixth Form Centre student Dylan Slater, who completed his A levels here with us last year before joining the company alongside two other alumni. Dylan and Lydia, another apprentice, have both been extremely busy in their first few months with the company, visiting sites in Northern Ireland and Scotland with colleagues as well as completing their coursework for the apprenticeship programme.

Senior cyber security engineer and team lead, Sam, himself a previous apprentice with Tekgem, talked students through his career so far, including all of the ongoing training opportunities he has benefitted from. In addition, there are opportunities to travel with the company and Dylan will be visiting Jordan in the spring as part of his role. 

Later in the morning, the team were able to simulate an attack on an operational technology system and demonstrate how the company would set up a firewall system to prevent any future attacks with the assistance of Ben, one of Tekgem’s senior networking engineers.

We are very grateful to the team from Tekgem for taking the time to speak to our students about their roles and career opportunities.