Transport professional Stephen Hughes was one of the first people to receive a Ready for the Future grant from Rees Jeffreys Road Fund.
The award enabled Stephen, a Graduate Transport Planner with Mott MacDonald, to study Global Standard for Nature-based Solutions at the International Union for Conservation of Nature (IUCN).
Stephen said, “I completed the course in February-March 2025 through a mixture of live online seminars during working hours and self-paced study in my spare time. I joined with a diverse range of professionals from around the world.”
“I am very grateful to Rees Jeffreys Road Fund for the opportunity to do this course. It has provided me with an invaluable understanding of Nature-based Solutions (NbS) and provided valuable general learnings which can read across into my own sector. I feel very fortunate to have had the chance to ‘go back to school’ and learn about something from scratch and outside of the day job. I intend to use the learnings to promote NbS or similar interventions as much as possible in my role. It is vital that they become mainstream common sense as opposed to their current status as isolated cases of best practice.”
“I would strongly encourage peers to apply for a Ready for the Future grant. It is a great way to embark on a structured programme of study and make the very most of your CPD time and effort.”
If you want to take your transport skills to a new level, and help address the gaps in skills in the sector, you can apply for a Ready for the Future grant. Our next deadline for applications is 3rd October 2025 and full details of how to apply are on our website here.
