PROFESSOR BRIAN COX PAYS A VISIT TO MIDDLESBROUGH COLLEGE CAMPUS
We were delighted to meet up with the famous physicist and TV presenter Professor Brian Cox CBE yesterday when he visited the Middlesbrough College campus to speak to young aspiring scientists and engineers.
It was a return visit for him seven years after he opened the £20m STEM training centre. Since then, the college has been actively helping to transform the region’s economic competitiveness and is part of the North East Institute of Technology (IoT) – a collaboration between further education providers, universities and employers who are recognised as leaders in technical training.
Professor Cox was impressed by the investment the college is making with its ongoing campus development programme of which our current projects – an extension to the STEM Centre, which can be seen behind Professor Cox in the photograph as well as the T-Levels Digital Centre (Digital Centre), play an important part.
Commenting on this investment which he believes will ‘put young people across the region at the forefront of the new industrial revolution’ and recalling his first visit to the Middlesbrough College campus, he said:
“The opening of its STEM centre back in 2015 was ground-breaking and genuinely surpassed my expectations – so when I heard about the new plans, I had to come back and learn more.
“We need more apprentices and STEM graduates and facilities like this, and the people here will be the driving force behind that – everyone will benefit from this investment.”
Last September Surgo commenced work on a £3.1 million design and build contract to extend the college’s STEM Centre by 1100 m2 to enable the delivery of a higher level of technical training, as the sole deliverer of Institute of Technology (IoT) accredited courses in the Tees Valley.
Meanwhile, our second contract award, the Digital Centre, is a 1600m2 three-storey facility which will include a new construction workshop and expanded catering facilities and will become home to specialist teaching spaces for media studies including subjects such as TV and film production as well as computer games.
We are very pleased to be building on our extensive experience of delivering high quality education facilities and playing our part in helping to support the regional economy with the construction of both these key science and technology projects.