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In the news
Week commencing 23/11/2009
Apprenticeships get royal seal of approval
The Apprenticeships, Skills, Children and Learning Act officially received Royal Assent on 12th November.
The aim of the Act is to give both young people and employers a higher quality Apprenticeship, and ensure there are more Apprenticeships available.
For lots of young people this means the chance to learn skills more likely to lead to a job.
To find out more about Apprenticeships, and why they could be the right choice for you, see our guide to Apprenticeships.
You can also find more information on the Apprenticeships website and read more with this DCSF Press notice.
All nurses will need Degrees by 2013
Nursing can be a physically demanding job.
According to the Department of Health, it can challenge the mind, too.
From 2013, the Department has announced that all new nurses in England should be educated to Degree level. Currently, just a quarter of nurses in England have a Degree.
This could make it more difficult to become a nurse in the first place. But it may also mean nurses take on more challenging tasks as part of their working lives.
Are you interested in becoming a nurse? If so, check out the nursing job profile on jobs4u, the Connexions Direct careers database. Find out what nurses do, how you can become a nurse, and how much you might earn.
You can also find out more with this BBC News story.
Microsoft pulls plug on illegal gaming
As many as 600,000 gamers have been cut off from Microsoft's Xbox Live service recently.
The reason? They had 'hacked' their consoles to play pirated games.
Game piracy is thought to cost the industry as much as £750m a year. Game and console makers are trying ever more complicated ways to prevent it.
Microsoft claim they can tell via Xbox Live when a gamer has hacked their own console, using software or 'modding' hardware chips.
You can find out more about illegal downloads in our article on DVD piracy and you can learn more with this BBC News story.
