Students & Graduates

RDF offers one year placements for students in the third year of their IT related degree. We offer up to 4 places a year and RDF is an equal opportunities employer, so our graduates come from a wide range of backgrounds and experience.  From the moment you join the technical team, you will play a key role in live project work or will join an IT support team delivering services to the customer base (internal and external).  A placement student's work is varied, challenging and rewarding and should enable students to gain a very good grasp of the IT environment. Many of our placement students return to RDF once they have completed their studies.

A graduate at RDF can expect to be exposed to the key areas of the development lifecycle being rotated around the core disciplines and different projects and each placement is assigned an experienced mentor to help their personal and technical development at a speed suited to them.  The first six months enables the graduate to get a thorough understanding of IT projects and the core activities within them; and intends to help the graduate identify a career ladder for themselves in their chosen preferred discipline.

But don’t just take our word for it, here are some of the testimonials of our previous graduates:

I was really lucky to be a part of the graduate scheme at RDF. The first thing that attracted me to this program was its ability to ensure that a graduate works in all the three phases of software development. So I started my career at RDF with hands-on experience in development. I worked in development for about 2-3 months followed by approximately the same duration in testing and then analysis. In all the three phases I worked with experienced and helpful colleagues throughout, thus enabling me to make the most of it and learn the technicalities in great detail. I was also assigned a mentor who is not only experienced in his field but is also a great colleague to work with. He helped me a lot by giving me the knowledge about various processes and technologies used at RDF. He also helped me to settle in the new and unfamiliar environment.

Right from day one I was given an opportunity to work on an important internal project. I then worked on several other projects including a client project. Working on different projects with excellent colleagues helped me a lot in building my confidence, so I was able to give my best in whatever I was assigned. Support from various colleagues and the opportunities I got at RDF helped me in finally deciding on my career which is Software Testing. Thanks to RDF for giving me this wonderful opportunity !

For the third year of my Computer Science degree I applied to do my industry placement with RDF. It was excellent to see so many of the technologies and practices I had learned about at university being used on real projects! Working in the technical team I gained lots of practical experience with software development tools and processes to compliment my final year of study. After finishing my degree RDF offered me a full-time role within the company & I am now employed as an Associate Practitioner