Redcar and Cleveland College has undergone something of a transformation in recent years.
Re-establishing its place at the heart of the community, it aims to help people brush up on the skills needed to meet future demand on its doorstep.
Whether that be school leavers wanting to develop the skills of their chosen trade or adult learners looking to retrain or upskill, college principal Jason Faulkner said: “Our aim is to ensure in Redcar we are equipped locally to train people with the technical skills required to meet the demand that developments like Teesworks are bringing to the area.”
To help do that this year the college has invested in a refit and refurb of its engineering facilities with refreshed resources, industry standard machinery, tools and equipment, the addition of a PPE and material testing rooms, all embedded in a culture of health and safety.
“It’s about creating a more industrial feel and getting our students practised in the skills, competencies and behaviours that would be expected of them in the working environment,” said Jason.
And by working directly with employers, the college is committed to leading from the front not just with traditional engineering skills but also looking to renewable energies, hydrogen technology as well as onshore and offshore wind.
“It is part of our role as the local college to educate our communities and help them to understand the emerging technologies and sectors,” said Jason.
“Here in the Tees Valley we are working towards a cleaner, greener economy and we believe the moves we are making at the college, working closely with industry experts, employers and the local and combined authorities, will support such agendas.”
Investment in the refurbished engineering hub followed the launch of the college’s outdoor industrial training rig in March this year, bringing increased opportunities for local training in the likes of decommissioning, job competencies, confined spaces and working at heights, as well as rope access, working in partnership with Total Solutions.
The college has also made a significant investment in its higher education engineering facilities, including bespoke programmable logic controller units and SCADA systems, a hydraulics and pneumatics training room, an advanced manufacturing production system robotic assembly cell, a CAD room, automation and robotics.
But Jason said: “We want to ensure Redcar has the capacity to train people not just for the world of engineering but also the wider skills that are required.
“Through our sector-based work academies we can take people with no background in engineering and develop their skills in readiness for the jobs that will be available.
“Working with employers, such as WSG and Northumbrian Water on our industrial cleaning sector based work academy, we can create bespoke courses that are structured in a way that provides skills for real jobs. As a college this is what we should be doing. It is about being responsive and demand led.”
Welcoming the college’s investment Tees Valley Mayor Ben Houchen said: “It is essential that our young people don’t get left behind as we recover from the impact of the coronavirus.
“We have already created hundreds of jobs on the Teesworks site, and over the coming months, as part of my plan for jobs, we will be creating hundreds more, and we need to make sure that our young people have the skills they need to take these jobs, which is why these new facilities are so crucial.
“By equipping our young people with the skills they need now, they can take advantage of the countless opportunities we are creating and start out on the path to a successful career, which means more money in their pockets for themselves and their families.
“With these new facilities alongside our new Teesworks skills academy, which we are setting up to train local people with the skills they need to take advantage of these jobs, we have a truly exciting and unique opportunity to shape our region’s workforce and improve people’s lives for generations to come.”
