Topping Out

One of the early decisions I made as Cabinet Secretary for Education & Lifelong Learning was to approve the merger between Glasgow Metropolitan College, Glasgow College of Commerce & Glasgow Nautical College. My then deputy Keith Brown & I agonised over the matter but it not only successfully produced Scotland's largest FE establishment , it also paved the way for a more ambitious programme of regional mergers which has revitalised the sector and created real focussed employment training for hundreds of thousands of young ( and older) people.

It also created a new dynamic for the renewal of the FE sectors infrastructure so this afternoon I was very pleased to break off from a day of constituency activity to travel into Glasgow to undertake the " topping out" of one of the three new buildings of the City of Glasgow College Riverside Campus which houses the college's Nautical Studies and StEM provision.

This picture is taken from the seventh floor of the new building where I shovelled some concrete into the last gap in the flooring , ably assisted by two apprentices who fortunately knew what we were meant to be doing. In addition to showing the cityscape it also features, at the bottom, the College's free fall lifeboat escape training facility which I have promised to come back and try one day.