TEENAGER Jack Green’s favourite hobby is tinkering with an old Land Rover in his dad’s shed.

Now the 18-year-old has a chance to work on a smaller car, after winning an apprenticeship with BMW Mini in Cowley.

Hundreds of young people apply every year for an apprenticeship with the firm and Jack, who lives in Piddington and is a former pupil at Lord Williams’s School in Thame, is one of 14 students to be chosen for the four-year course.

The new recruits at Cowley are joining 131 apprentices already working in Oxford, at Hams Hall, near Birmingham, in Swindon, and at Rolls-Royce in Goodwood.

The apprentices, aged 16 to 22, will spend three or four years with the plant, depending on their chosen role at the factory, and will all work in supporting roles on the main production line at BMW Mini.

Jack, a first-year engineering technician apprentice, said: “I’m absolutely delighted to be chosen out of hundreds of applicants.

“I was interested in sciences at school and I have had a passion for engineering for a long time.

“My hobby is building Land Rovers from the chassis upwards in the shed and I drive a green Land Rover after passing my driving test earlier this year.

“At the moment, I’m in my first year of the apprenticeship at Oxford and Cherwell Valley College in Oxpens, and we go to the plant in the second year.

“There’s an opportunity to complete a foundation degree in engineering as part of this apprenticeship, and I would love to develop my career with the company.

“My parents were very pleased when they found out I had been accepted.

“I did start out doing AS-Levels but then I realised it was not for me and the school were very supportive when I told them the direction I wanted to go in.”

Ed Moss, UK apprentice training manager for BMW Group, said: “These 14 apprentices are likely to join us full-time. At the Oxford and Swindon plants we have a 90 per cent placement rate.

“In the past, we have taken apprentices from Fitzharrys School in Abingdon and this year a number came from St Birinus School in Didcot.

“Later on I will get the apprentices to go back to their schools to talk about what they are doing because that’s much more powerful than me standing up and telling pupils about it.

“There are hundreds of candidates for these places and we try to pre-select them on the basis of what they are expected to achieve at GCSE. We are looking for four grade Bs and above in English, maths and sciences.

“There is a degree option as part of the apprenticeship which can be finished on a day-release basis.”

Last week, it emerged that sales of the BMW Mini are once again on the increase.

Figures showed 3,120 cars were sold in the UK during October – a rise of more than 65 per cent on the same month last year.