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PATHWAYS PROGRAMME

EDINBURGH & SOUTH EAST SCOTLAND

Edinburgh & South East Scotland needs more engineering and construction professionals by 2026; a huge opportunity across the region to address not just built environment skills gaps, but also take action on pre-existing inequalities evident in the industry's workforce. 

EqualEngineers is running the Edinburgh & South East Scotland  Pathways Programme partnering with the Housing, Construction & Infrastructure (HCI) Skills Gateway. The purpose here is to reduce the inequalities within the region and mentoring the engineers of the future.

To measure the feasibility of a pilot regional programme, in the recent months we have been in communication with Edinburgh and South East Scotland based institutions, to identify how they can support the project.

A total of 26 organisations that took part in our interviews are:

  • Colleges ( Borders College, Edinburgh College, Fife College, West Lothian College)
  • Community & Third Sector ( Fife Community Trade Hub, Melville Housing Association, The Ridge)
  • Universities ( Edinburgh Napier University, Heriot-Watt University, University of Edinburgh)
  • Local Authorities ( City of Edinburgh Council, East Lothian Council, Fife Council, Midlothian Council, West Lothian Council)
  • Industry ( Anderson Strathern, Balfour Beatty, Built Environment - Smarter Transformation, Cala Homes, Max Fordham, Morrison Construction, Robertson Group, Mott MacDonald, WSP, SWECO, Royal Institution of Chartered Surveyors).

The ambition of the mentoring programme is to raise the number of individuals from historically excluded and minoritised groups into housing, construction and infrastructure working opportunities, by training and supporting them through the transition between engineering education to engineering employment.

Click to read feasibility report

Dr Mark McBride-Wright 
Founder & Managing Director, EqualEngineers

Being a recognised diversity and inclusion leader, our founder Dr Mark McBride-Wright, has designed the Pathways Programme to help engineering students that face many challenges and discriminations to access the employability outcomes in the engineering working environment.

 

Mark says:

"We have so many challenges facing us, from net zero to the climate crisis. It’s imperative that we empower people from all backgrounds to consider opportunities in this sector. Without question a more diverse workforce helps everyone to expand their ideas and drive excellence so I really hope the Pathways Programme can help catalyse getting more diverse talent onto an education or employment pathway in this industry.

The Pathways Programme is running right now, providing students access to things like in-person careers insights and employability workshop sessions, virtual training on work readiness and interpersonal skills development. We have also run a mentoring programme to pair-up students with engineers from industry, to improve their understanding of employment and provide support to their concerns and opportunities for work experience, placement, internship and graduate roles".

 

PATHWAYS PROGRAMME HCI REPORT 2022

To celebrate the start of the EqualEngineers Pathways Programme in Scotland, we are proud to release the "Pathways Edinburgh & South East Scotland" report, in partnership with the Housing, Construction & Infrastructure Skills Gateway, which brings together the foundation of the programme, the strategy and institutions involved in the project. Click below to download the report.

Click to read feasibility report
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