A £2.5 million investment to boost new job skills across Shropshire

The government’s net zero growth plan envisages hundreds of thousands of new jobs in the coming years in areas such as installing heat pumps and maintaining solar panels, as well as producing electric vehicles and environmental consultancy.

To address staff and skills shortages in these areas, the Marches Education Partnership has been provided with funding from the government’s Local Skills Improvement Fund (LSIF), with a particular focus on green technologies.

The partnership includes Herefordshire, Ludlow and North Shropshire College, Shrewsbury College and Telford College, working with local training providers Herefordshire and Worcestershire Group Training Association, In-Comm Training and SBC Training Services, with support from Telford & Wrekin Council.

The money has been spent on new equipment and technology and the creation of 14 new training centers which will provide new courses and teaching facilities, including workshops and refurbished classrooms equipped with equipment to industry standards, in close collaboration with local employers.

The courses address specific skills needs identified as priority sectors for Marches in the Local Skills Improvement Plan (LSIP), developed for the region by Shropshire Chamber of Commerce.

Projects to be submitted by partners in the coming weeks include Herefordshire Ludlow and North Shropshire College, which are seeing significant progress in the engineering and construction sectors, as evidenced by advances in automation, including PLC-enabled CNC lathes and mills and extensive cyber-physical systems .

This month, Shrewsbury College will open its new advanced manufacturing and welding facility, equipped with state-of-the-art robotic welding equipment, laser cutting machines and CNC press brakes.

Telford College is launching 16 short courses, and engineers from local employers Muller and Denso have started sampling modules that focus on circuit board design and repair and micro-soldering techniques.

The Herefordshire and Worcestershire Group Training Association has already opened a new automation workshop to host new training programs starting this autumn, including ‘Introduction to Programmable Logic Controllers’ (PLC), ‘Advanced PLCs’ and ‘Introduction to Robotics’ “. Engineering students will also use the new workshop.

In-Comm Training is officially launching a state-of-the-art automation workstation at its technical academy in Telford. The £200,000 investment will include an ABB 6-axis industrial robot and a bespoke conveyor system replicating a real production line, which will give students access to component nesting and detection, robotic handling, PLC programming and connection systems. Level 3 and 4 modular courses introduce employees to new technologies and help them gain technical skills to increase productivity.