East Ayrshire pupils build solid foundations with Ayrshire College
Ayrshire College successfully delivered a week-long bespoke building services course for pupils from Auchinleck and Cumnock Academies, at Dumfries House.
Created at the request of The Prince’s Foundation, the course was delivered to secondary school pupils who may soon be migrating to the new £68m Barony Campus.
A site visit to the Barony Campus was arranged for the pupils by Morrison Construction. The pupils now have the choice of staying on at school or opting to transition to a January start course at Ayrshire College.
Every pupil who started the course achieved a City & Guilds unit in Electrical Installation and the Industrial Cadets Bronze Award. The course participants were awarded their completion certificates at a celebration event held on Friday – which was attended by Ayrshire College Principal Carol Turnbull.
Elsewhere on the Friday, pupils teamed up with modern apprentices in plumbing at Ayrshire College, to tackle a plumbing workshop challenge. All lead for the challenge was supplied by Associated Lead Mills Ltd (ALM).
They also took part in a lead work masterclass delivered by Malcolm Thomson of David Blakes & Sons, from Musselburgh.
At the conclusion of the course, pupils were given the opportunity to speak directly with representatives from Ayrshire College, Dumfries House, The Scottish Electrical Charitable Training Trust (SECTT) and the Scottish & Northern Ireland Plumbing Employers Federation (SNIPEF) to get careers advice.
Cameron Bell, Head of Construction Technology, Trades, Motor Vehicle and Horticulture at Ayrshire College: “It is very important to engage school pupils to hopefully inspire them to take up a career in building services, and we were very fortunate to have the support of our partners from SECTT and SNIPEF to support the pupils in providing valuable career advice.
“Having the first-year plumbing apprentices work on the lead work challenge was really useful for both the transfer of knowledge and skills relating to the task, but more importantly to have another young person act as a career mentor to the pupils.
“The leadwork masterclass was a great way to round off a successful week and we were very fortunate to have Malcolm Thomson give up his time to demonstrate his incredible skills in this area. Overall it was a very successful course and I hope that we can continue this partnership with the Prince’s Foundation to benefit local pupils in the future.”
13 December 2019
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