Training centres

Four Dwellings School

At the Four Dwellings School in Quinton, Birmingham, Lovell helped establish a construction training facility. This facility is part of the Quinzone Centre, created by the Quinzone Excellence in Cities Education Action Zone. Used by 14 to 16 year-old pupils from local schools, the facility allows students to work towards the Foundation Construction Award.

Since opening in 2003, it has grown to include a new plumbing and painting & decorating section, and in 2005 Lovell also helped create a separate brickwork training facility. A total of 230 pupils are now on construction courses at the centre. Lovell craft training advisor Les Inkpen, who makes monthly visits to the Quinton training centre, also helps arrange work experience placements for trainees on the company's sites in the region. He says: "Work experience is vital to help students put what they've learned into context and show them how a construction site actually operates."

Students from the centre also have the opportunity to join the company's workforce. Last year, Lovell gave apprenticeships to two students who trained through the Quinzone facility and is looking to recruit further apprentices from this year's crop of students.

Parkfield High School

Lovell worked with Parkfield High School, Wolverhampton, to create a new vocational training centre for students. The new centre, funded by the school and Lovell, provides vocational training for students in a variety of skills including carpentry, bricklaying, plumbing and painting and decorating. They will also be able to learn about Modern Methods of Construction.

The building comprises four separate vocational training rooms and a dedicated area for vehicle, construction plant and equipment maintenance, together with a classroom and reception area. The new centre will also be available out of school hours for use as a vocational training centre by the local community.

Tamworth Training Centre

As part of its commitment to training and people development, Lovell has opened a national Training and Conference Centre at the company's Tamworth head office. The new centre, which houses dedicated conference facilities and a specialist IT training suite, has four meeting rooms that are used on a daily basis. It also hosts the company's staff induction days. Twenty different training courses are run from the centre's IT suite, which is equipped with the latest computer technology.

The IT suite also doubles as an in-house testing centre for the computer-based health and safety test which workers must take to obtain their Construction Skills Certification Scheme (CSCS) card. The industry's most widely recognised competency card, the CSCS card was introduced ten years ago with the aim of protecting the quality of work on site and reducing accidents. So far more than 300 people have taken the CSCS health and safety test at the Tamworth test centre.

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