Metro Mayor checks in on new skills opportunities in healthcare and construction

Metro Mayor Dan Norris met health and construction students at Weston College and also helped celebrate the official national launch of the UK’s twelve “Institutes of Technologies”.

Weston College is the lead college for the West of England Institute of Technology in partnership with Bath College, Gloucestershire College, Yeovil College and UWE Bristol, and local employers including Airbus, the NHS and the National Composites Centre.

At Weston College’s Health and Active Living Centre, Mayor Norris was shown the College’s new simulation ward where students train on state of the art, life-like dummy patients which breathe, blink and groan. The Mayor spoke to students and then got hands on performing CPR on a training dummy. He was then shown some of the College’s construction facilities at the Construction Training Centre.

Dan Norris said: “I’m delighted to visit the brilliant facilities at Weston College – the injuries on those patient dummies were worryingly lifelike, and I was fascinated to meet some of the people training to go into the building trade, the sights and sounds brought back a lot of memories for me from the days I was a scaffolder’s assistant. The young people I met were really enthusiastic and motivated and they know exactly what skills they need and were telling me about the full-time jobs they know they can get at the end of their studies.”

Whilst at the Construction Training Centre Dan met Thomas Aram who is on a 360 Excavator training programme. Thomas was made redundant from his previous job, so training at Weston College is providing him with an opportunity to reskill and find a new job.

Thomas said, “It’s been tough since I was made redundant – my Universal Credit Advisor told me about this opportunity at Weston College, and I jumped at the chance, as I’d always wanted to work in the construction sector. I’m on a 10-day programme which will give me the qualification I need to get a job, and once I have that there are more training opportunities to increase my skill level.”

Dr Paul Phillips CBE, Principal and Chief Executive at Weston College commented: “We were delighted to welcome Dan to the College to meet our learners and to hear first-hand about their experiences and future career aspirations. His interaction with learners was superb and it gave us all a boost. It was great to meet somebody genuinely interested in what we do and our learners.”