Exciting news has just been announced that the UK’s first national aviation education and skills campus is being planned at Stansted Airport.
The aim is that Stansted Airport College, an existing joint venture between Stansted Airport and Harlow College, will become a national centre of excellence for skills training in the aviation industry able to meet the future skills and recruitment needs of the industry.
The new project will build on the success of Stansted Airport College, which last year opened its doors to 500 new students, made possible by a ground-breaking partnership between education and industry.
The new plans would see the college’s current learner capacity of 500 rise to around 1,000 per year and see Stansted Airport’s award-winning Aerozone, an aviation-themed learning hub visited by 15,000 people a year and built to inspire and encourage young people into the key STEM subjects of science, technology, engineering and maths with a view to careers in the aviation industry, become part of the campus.
Ken O’Toole, Stansted’s chief executive, said: “We are all very proud of the college and the unique, ground-breaking partnership between education and industry that led to its creation. It enjoyed an extremely successful launch year, attracting over 300 new students, and as its popularity continues to grow, now is clearly the right time to look at how we can build on this success and explore opportunities to develop an educational campus here at the airport.”
Aviation minister Paul Maynard said: “The aviation industry is much more than planes and airports, it is built on skills, enterprise and innovation. The opportunities and jobs created stretch across the whole of the UK and education must remain at the forefront of our plans for such a crucial industry.”
