Students help save endangered species by building Zoological Centre near Bedford

Full-time students from Tresham College construction department have been gaining real life work experience by helping to build the Zoological Education Centre at Shuttleworth College, Old Warden.

A group of 20 Level One bricklayers and carpenters worked in relays over ten days to help construct one of the facility blocks on the site.

The project brought together students from the Shuttleworth countryside campus and Tresham College’s Corby campus in Northamptonshire, both part of The Bedford College Group.

Mark Eustace, Project Manager, overseeing the build of the zoological centre, only one of its kind for an FE college in the UK: “This very unusual development gives these students a chance to see the challenges of the modern construction industry for themselves where professionalism as well as top skills are vital.

“Recently work has begun elsewhere on the site on a biome which will create a tropical atmosphere and an alligator pool. This is the only one I know of for an FE college. This experience is not the usual housing estate or office block development for construction students!”

If you would like to know more about the new Zoological Education Centre opening in September 2019 visit www.shuttleworth.ac.uk which includes details about courses on offer. For more details on Construction courses at Tresham visit www.tresham.ac.uk