Summary

Historic England are excited to be seeking a Listing and Casework Assistant Apprentice. This is rare exciting opportunity for the successful candidate to achieve a Level 4 Historic Environment Advice Assistant Apprenticeship, working within our East of England Regions team, with an office base in Cambridge.

With a Historic Environment Advice Assistant apprenticeship, you will learn “on the job” in the role of a Listing and Casework Assistant and undertake a formal training programme to enhance your knowledge and understanding of how we assign significance in a national context and manage change to the historic environment and how it connects communities.

This role includes co-ordinating and administering listing and development advice casework; researching and assessing historic places including buildings, archaeological remains and designed landscapes; logging and processing casework and assessing sites for statutory designation. You will also at times act as a first point of contact for enquiries from the public, owners and other stakeholders.

As a Listing and Casework Assistant you will be based in the Business Support Team and will primarily be developing your role in this team; however, over the course of your apprenticeship you will spend dedicated times with all the teams in Region:  learning about Development Advice, Partnerships, and Business Management.  You would also have the opportunity to be involved in major initiatives in places identified as regional priorities and where great heritage work is most needed This will include projects in the Listing Work Plan some of which will be concluding in 2026-27.

The Level 4 Historic Environment Advice Assistant Apprenticeship is offered as a 27 month Fixed Term Contract, and will be based in the Cambridge office.

What you will be doing

You will be working towards completion of the Level 4 Historic Environment Advice Assistant Apprenticeship over the course of 27 months. 80% of your time will be spent in the workplace, and 20% of your time will be spent “off the job”, completing a training programme specially designed for your apprenticeship, delivered with our training partners Strode College. The training will be delivered via online learning, with support from your tutor and mentor to ensure you achieve all the skill and knowledge required.

In this role you will learn from experienced colleagues who provide advice to all kinds of people on the Historic Environment.  At work (80% of your time) the experience you will gain on the job will include:

• Understanding the variety and importance of our historic environment including archaeology, historic buildings, designed landscapes, conservation areas, and other unique heritage sites.

• Undertaking research on individual sites and wider areas using a range of information sources such as aerial photographs, historic maps, plans, and reports.

• Interpreting application documents including photographs, drawings, plans and reports.

• Logging and processing applications to add new sites to the National Heritage List for England (NHLE) or to make changes to historic places (such as planning applications).

• Assign significance to heritage assets.

• Attending meetings with external partners and members of the public to discuss heritage management and promote the benefits of the historic environment. This might include on-site discussions about specific planning or listing applications, strategic meetings with local authorities, and heritage training/events.

• Contributing to advice and recommendations (made by phone, email and letter) about the management of the historic environment to colleagues, site owners, decision makers (such as local authorities), and members of the public, using clear language and references to appropriate policy and legislation.

• An understanding of Historic England's grant giving priorities and strategies

• The ability to explain and promote the success of our projects in a positive and engaging way, which reaches a broad audience.

A key element of your apprenticeship will be the development of a Portfolio of Evidence of your on-the-job work and training. As you progress you will add pieces of evidence to your portfolio that you can use to demonstrate the relevant knowledge, skills and behaviours required for this apprenticeship.  Pieces of evidence are things like work products, case studies, reports on professional activities, meetings or project work.

What will you learn

Over 2 years you will undertake a taught programme of training (20% of your time) delivered by Strode College tutors, in partnership with experts from across Historic England. This will give you helpful background heritage knowledge and valuable skills that you will be able to use and apply at work and will help you understand the bigger picture of Historic England’s work. The programme is taught through a mixture of lectures, workshops, site visits, e-learning, assignments and projects and covers things such as:

• How the heritage sector works: The people, organisations, policy and legislation that make up this fascinating area of work.

• The fundamentals of archaeological, landscape and architectural history.

• The skills required to identify different types of heritage sites and objects and to assess their condition.

• The knowledge and skills required to analyse, date, monitor and conserve a range of historic places.

• The value of heritage to the local economy, to the communities living nearby and to people who visit the heritage sites we help to protect, enhance and reveal.

• The professional language and terminology that will support your communication in the workplace, in particular when making recommendations concerning the historic environment.

What we are looking for

• You will show a passion and interest in history, heritage and the historic environment, with an ambition to start a career in content and marketing

• You are well-organised with excellent attention to detail.

• A great team worker with the ability to get along easily with others.

• Experience of using Microsoft Office in particular Word, PowerPoint and Excel.

• You can demonstrate good communication skills, both written and verbal.

• You are curious and have a desire to continuously learn.

Please ensure you highlight your experience, skills and capabilities based on the above criteria in your online application.

Why work for Historic England

We are committed to promoting equality of opportunity for everyone. Diversity helps us to perform better and attract more people to support our work. We welcome and encourage job applications from people of all backgrounds.

We particularly encourage applications from Black, Asian and Minority Ethnic candidates and candidates with disabilities as they are underrepresented within Historic England at this level.

Historic England want all of our candidates to shine in the recruitment process. Please tell us what we can do to make sure you can show us your very best self. You can contact us by email at recruitmentTeam@Historicengland.org.uk if you have any recruitment queries.

At Historic England we use a hiring system called Applied. Applied is a behavioural science-backed recruitment platform that reduces bias, improves quality of hire and increases diversity. We do not use CV application for the majority of our hiring processes. You will answer a selection of questions that allow our hiring teams to test your skills and suitability for the role.

To ensure a fair and inclusive recruitment process for everyone the use of AI or automated tools is not permitted.

Provisional interview dates:  June 2025

Please follow the link for a full copy of the Job Description –

https://cms.historicengland.org.uk/media/522lfosw/listing-and-casework-assistant-apprentice-jd-2025-east-of-england.odt