Delivering our 15 year anniversary pledge

To mark our 15th anniversary in January this year, we pledged to deliver 15 influential opportunities in 2025 to help young people start a career in the creative industry.

As part of the campaign, we also wanted to engage in community outreach and build local partnerships to implement a well-rounded approach for maximum impact.

Now we’re halfway through the year and we’ve delivered nine influential opportunities spanning work experience, placements, internships, mentoring and teacher encounters.

The programme has engaged high school and college students, as well as graduates looking to take the first step in their creative career.

Interested in a range of disciplines across branding, marketing, design and digital, the aspiring creatives have worked closely with our team over the last 6 months to learn fundamental skills and experience the way agencies work.

English Language graduate, Charlotte Tatton, is currently on a 4-week marketing placement. Here’s how she’s getting on so far.

“During my work experience, I’m learning how to adapt my university skills into career skills. I’ve had the opportunity to broaden my knowledge on SEO, content writing and social media, as well as being involved in client meetings.

“I’ve also witnessed how inspiring a collaborative workspace and agency is – different minds and creatives coming together to deliver outstanding pieces of work.

“I’m looking forward to seeing how else I can gain further insight and propel my early career in the creative industry.”

In collaboration with Stoke on Trent College, we’re currently working with students on a live website brief to help them upskill alongside their studies.

We created a one page website design with a style sheet for students to code with the support of our Digital Services Director, Gavin, and Website Developer, Adam. They’ll be returning to the college in the new academic year to re-engage the students with the brief and offer insight into HTML, CSS and JavaScript.

We also held our first teacher encounter with Stoke-on-Trent College, organised by Naomi Baxter from Stoke-on-Trent & Staffordshire Growth Hub.

We welcomed two brilliant creative teachers, Nicky and Dec, to our local studio to give them a clearer understanding of what creative careers look like in practice. The room was full of energy, ideas and a real shared passion for creativity and education.

Following the day, Nicky kindly followed up with a lovely message, “Just wanted to say thank you to you and the team at Starbots Creative for letting us come over and speak with you today. Great team and a lovely creative working environment with lots of good insights.”