college partnerships with the construction industry announced
7 November 2006
Introducing the debate on the FET College Bill this afternoon, the Minister
of Education said, "The Bill is not only important for setting up a specific
statutory platform for colleges. It is also important because our current
shortage of skills poses the biggest threat to the infrastructure programme of
government."
Currently about 400 000 students attend FET colleges and 700 000 attend
higher education institutions (HEI).
Government plans to increase the number of students attending colleges. To
support this aim, an FET bursary and student loan scheme was announced by
Minister Manuel in his Medium Term Budget Policy statement on 25 October
2006.
The college sector has been redesigned so that from next year they will be
able to offer intermediate and high level skills to students from the age 16 to
mature adults.
The Minister of Education said, "All indicators of economic growth and
development point to the fact that we must have more artisans in all the
economic sectors in our country. We believe colleges are best placed to teach
these skills alongside industry and other partners. So the time for the college
sector has come. Now is the time for employers to look to the college sector
for those critical skills they need in the immediate future."
The Minister is pleased to announce today that leading companies in the
construction industry have entered into a partnership with the Department of
Education and FET colleges.
Next year, five leading construction companies will assist in training
artisans in FET colleges. The five listed companies in the partnership are
Murray and Roberts, Aveng (Grinaker-LTA), Wilson Bayly Holmes-Ovcon's (WBHO),
Group Five and Basil Read. The benefit of the partnership agreement is that
increased numbers of skilled artisans will become available for the entire
construction sector.
Craig Lawrence of Murray and Roberts says, "This is a partnership to develop
key staff for the whole industry. Other companies may wish to join the
partnership at a later stage and we would welcome this."
Two colleges have been selected as the flagship sites for offering the
Building and Civil Construction programme. The sites are the Belhar Campus of
Northlink College in Cape Town and the Atteridgeville campus of Tshwane south
college.
In 2007, 100 students will be enrolled at each campus, an additional 300 in
2008 and a further 600 students in 2009. From 2009 there will be approximately
1 000 students enrolled at each campus on the Building and Civil Construction
programme.
The partnership is a national project. The Department of Education will
determine the allocation of funding while the provincial departments will
ensure the alignment of the project to provincial objectives.
The FET colleges will be responsible for developing their sites and staff to
offer the high level programme. They will recruit and screen students and
ensure that they have supervised workplace experience.
On completion of a three-year programme, students will be eligible to become
supervisors on construction sites.
Minister of Education, Naledi Pandor, comments, "The construction industry
needs many more skilled staff and our colleges need industry support and
interventions to ensure that the courses offered are relevant and up to
date."
Contact:
Lunga Ngqengelele
Tel: (012) 312 5538
Cell: 082 566 0446
E-mail: ngqengelele.l@doe.gov.za
Issued by: Department of Education
7 November 2006
