Wernick helps Swansea students get ‘Offsite Ready’
University students in Swansea had their eyes opened to offsite construction during an informative visit to the Construction Wales Innovation Centre (CWIC) and the Wernick Buildings factory in Port Talbot.
The students from the University of Wales Trinity Saint David (UWTSD) were some of the first to benefit from a new initiative launched by the Construction Scotland Innovation Centre (CSIC) to ensure construction professionals of the future are ‘Offsite Ready’.
The day started with a talk on Modern Methods of Construction from Lindsay Richards, Senior Lecturer at UWTSD and Project Director for the Offsite Ready project which CWIC is a partner of. Andy King, Deputy MD at Wernick Buildings and Kevin Lewis, Regional Sales Manager followed with their presentation ‘Getting Ready for the Offsite Revolution’.
Budding Building Surveyors, Quantity Surveyors, Construction Managers, Architectural Technologists studying at UWTSD accompanied by their lecturers then took the short trip to Wernick Buildings where they could see how modular buildings are produced in a factory.
For the next 8 months, CWIC along with its pan-Wales partners (Spokes) will deliver the Offsite Ready programme all over Wales.
The programme will soon offer a range of free online learning resources and face-to-face training events with the aim of improving the quality and consistency of training in offsite construction.
Lindsay Richards, Project Director for Offsite Ready at the Construction Wales Innovation Centre, said: “It has been fantastic to give staff and students an opportunity to experience the advantages of offsite manufacturing and to embrace modern methods of construction through our structured day with Wernick. We are so grateful to Andy King and Kevin Lewis of Wernick for sharing their knowledge and experience. We are aware that greater collaborative partnering is required between all construction professionals to accomplish an effective ‘offsite manufacturing’ strategy in the UK and what a better place to start than with the Construction professionals of the future at UWTSD!”
Andy King added: “The Offsite Ready project ties in with our business strategy to educate about offsite construction and also develop close links with local education outlets. Students were fully engaged throughout and it was a pleasure to take them around the factory to see face to face how our buildings are manufactured.”
