The courses will be developed and delivered by UM and TikTok employees and will incorporate office visits, mentoring and summer internship placements. The academy aims to engage with young people before they make decisions about their further education and encourage them to consider a career in the creative comms industry.

The academy works to show young people that anyone can aspire to work in the media industry regardless of their background. “As an industry, we are very aware we have a way to go when it comes to building a more diverse workforce. By engaging with young people at a grass roots level we hope to bring in fresh perspectives that will help us future proof our clients’ businesses,” says Alice Archer, managing partner for communications & culture at UM

The curriculum has been designed to deliver on the core skills students will need to get started in a data-driven digital world. The collaborative sessions with TikTok and Spotify aim to put this information into a real-life context, whereby students will work on a live Spotify brief and present their ideas to client teams.

Tasha Lenton, media strategy at Spotify EMEA, says, “We were very keen to be involved in this initiative and hope it will equip the students with both the skills and the confidence to make them consider careers with companies like our own. I suspect we have as much to learn from this new generation of talent as they will from us."

The Futureproof Academy will launch in Feltham-based Springwest Academy, where it will deliver courses to over 300 students in year 10 and 11.