Earlier this year, Weston College launched their Aerospace Training Programme with Jingjiang Specialized Training School in China.

The exciting initiative involves the development and implementation, of aerospace manufacturing training, onsite at Jingjiang School. Jingjiang School are looking to provide the highly skilled workforce required to operate in their aerospace manufacturing industry and specifically for a joint venture (JV) in Jingjiang involving AVIC International and the Shanghai Aircraft Manufacturing Co. Ltd.

Last week saw the start of online training, with Weston College’s Engineering faculty supporting the team at Jingjiang School, with the development of a range of specific skills and capabilities in manufacturing and the assembling of metallic and composite aircraft structures, e.g., aircraft fuselage, wings, and empennage.

The training sessions will take place weekly over Microsoft Teams, involving practical workshop demonstrations and theoretical sessions, delivered by different members of the Weston College Engineering faculty sharing their knowledge and skillset. Jingjiang School are currently building a brand-new workshop to support the delivery of the new Weston College Aerospace Training Programme.

Jingjiang School are a large specialized vocational school that caters primarily to students of a similar age range to UK Further Education colleges. Jingjiang School, like Weston College, has an outstanding reputation through delivery of excellent outcomes for learners with employment rates, pass rates and student satisfaction rates in the high nineties year-on-year. The school boasts a national level engineering training centre with 85 practical laboratories and workshops specialising in electrical and electronics, hydraulics and pneumatics, numerical control machining, computer networking technologies, and automobile maintenance.

Aerospace manufacturing will be a new strand of activity for the school, drawing on the expertise and established educational systems currently delivered at Weston College.

Weston College Group Principal and Chief Executive Sir Paul Phillips said: “We are delighted to be working in partnership with Jingjiang School, and to support them with the development of their staff to train the next generation of engineers in the Jiangsu Province.

“This is an exciting moment for us at Weston College, to officially start the training programme. Over the coming months we will be working very closely with Jingjiang School, sharing best practice, and most importantly, creating brighter futures across the world!”

In September, our Year 1 students visited Wimbleball Lake Exmoor, to take part in a range of activities including high ropes and canoeing.  

These types of adventurous activities are a pivotal part to all our courses, as they promote the development of confidence, teamwork and vocational skills e.g. working at heights. 

Students experienced a busy, but exhilarating day followed by a barbecue. This trip was a great opportunity for students to meet other students and staff across the whole provision. 

This past week we had over 30 different students engage with the Esports Academy with trials that we ran in 3 different games to determine which students would be involved with the British Esports Student Championships (BESC). Every student showed excellent professionalism and “good manners” to each other whilst competing for places with each student commenting on how much they enjoyed themselves and wanting to do it again!

On Tuesday we did our first set of try outs on Overwatch and had 12 students join in for 3 hours! Every single person played their very best and impressed with excellent displays of skill and high levels of communication. It was so difficult to make a final decision on the final team of 5 starters and 2 substitute players. In the end we decided to shortlist some candidates that we wanted to have another look at and give the other 4 players, who were unable to show up for the day, a fair chance to show off their skills. Roll on Thursday 29th for round 2!!

On Wednesday we had Valorant and an incredible 17 students showed up to try out! We split the students up into 3 teams as they all had two rounds against each other. Over the course of the 3 hours+ try out, the students gave us the opportunity to assess their skills, communication and teamwork. All of the students were impressive, and the games were highly entertaining, with our final game where we mixed the teams up for a second time being an extremely close match!

We had the difficult task again of choosing 5 starters and 3 substitutes and on Friday we announced our decisions after some considered assessments and consultation with each other. It wasn’t easy letting 9 students know that they hadn’t made it, but we anticipate that they will be back after the Winter split ends. The Valorant team has already spent 2 evenings training with each other and getting to know each other better, their passion and determination to improve and perform well in the BESC is inspiring to see.

Thursday was Rocket League day! We had another 7 students show up and try out for the team. The games were very exciting to watch with each player showing why they should be on the team. We spent a little over an hour and a half putting the students through their paces and eventually we managed to have a decision on the 5 students who would be representing us for the Winter split.

We are excited to see our Valorant and Rocket League teams in action this Wednesday within the BESC first round of the Swiss stage and we’re looking forward to the second round of trials for Overwatch on Thursday to determine the team that will be competing for us in our pursuit to get to Nationals in the spring, and hopefully the in person (LAN) Grand Finals at the British Esports Performance Center in June!