Students from St Peter’s Catholic School in Guildford have welcomed the opportunity to learn about a career in housing by visiting a local development being built by housing provider Abri.
Gardeners Walk in Westway is a development of 37 homes which will be entirely affordable. Students visited the site to hear from Abri colleagues about their roles and to get hands-on experience of the different skills needed to build a home.
To help highlight the diversity a career in housing can provide, Abri was keen to showcase construction is for both women and men. Recent figures from the Office for National Statistics figures show that just 14.2 per cent of the construction workforce in the UK is female.
Claire Coxsell, Regional Development Manager and Project Manager at Abri said:
“It was a pleasure to welcome the students from St Peter’s for a tour of the site and we hope to have sparked their interest by sharing our passion and excitement for the industry and showcasing what housing professions can offer.
“At Abri we understand the importance of having inclusive and diverse teams who bring different skillsets and perspectives. The construction industry can be so rewarding for the benefits it brings to the community. The perception however can be it’s just for men, but we want to inspire women too. Across the industry we’re also facing a skills shortage as the average age of the UK construction worker is 42. We need to entice the next generation to ensure we stay innovative and have fresh ideas. First hand introductions like this help people feel comfortable exploring career paths and we hope the experience has encouraged potential housebuilders of the future.”
Twelve students were onsite and learnt about a variety of careers including what a trainee site manager does and the essential role health and safety plays when building homes. Pupils were also given the chance to shape their local community, helping with the build of the homes by taking part in plumbing tasks and laying block paving.
St Peter’s School student Natasha Tarr said:
“The day has given me a real insight into the number of different jobs that go into developing homes. It was useful listening to what people do and being able to ask questions which
