Princess Royal presents training award to Aurora

Having been informed in August that The Aurora Group had scooped a prestigious Princess Royal Training Award ‘for outstanding training and skills development’, Darren Goodenough, Aurora’s Head of Learning and Development, headed to Fishmonger’s Hall in London earlier this month, to receive a plaque from Princess Anne.   

Joining Darren at the awards ceremony were National Training Manager Jemma Tembey and Regional Learning Training and Assessor Bethany Rides.

Aurora was among a number of notable businesses and public bodies to receive 2025 training awards, including JCB, GSK, Diageo, Costa Coffee, Domino’s and IBM.

Darren said: “Picking up a fancy award in London is great but the truly rewarding aspect is seeing our staff develop and grow within Aurora because this will have a positive impact on our student outcomes.”

Run by the City & Guilds Foundation, the awards recognise outstanding training and skills development programmes which have positively impacted organisations, people as well as the wider society.

Darren said his team were able to evidence tangible real outcomes for employees on Aurora’s ‘Specialist Support for Teaching Assistants L3’ programme. 

"It was such an honour for one of our training programmes to be recognised for its quality and for the real difference it’s making to our colleagues. It’s been a real team effort to bring together the evidence that underpinned our submission." Darren Goodenough

Since the in-house training programme was launched in 2020, more than 50 teaching assistants have completed the training, with 70% gaining promotion and retention rates rising from 34% to 74%.