We were delighted to host students from Ayrshire College’s Civil Engineering Foundation Apprenticeship at our Ayrshire Hospice site this week.

Site Manager Jason Boyle, who is also a former student of Ayrshire College, treated the college students to a site tour of the sympathetic refurbishment project.

The ambitious multi-million-pound project will see the traditional home of the hospice at Racecourse Road in Ayr be redeveloped.

We are carrying out demolition and refurbishment of some of the existing buildings as part of the redevelopment. As well as the construction of new extensions forming a state-of-the-art new build In-Patient Unit (IPU) and a modern Hub building providing connectivity through the ‘heart of the Hospice’.

The Hub, which is located at the main entrance, will function as the social heart of the hospice. The space is designed to host a series of public and user friendly functional areas such as the entrance lobby and reception, and a small Hospice shop. A café with public access and opening onto the new courtyard will also be available.

Before we commenced on-site, the facilities were vacated whereby enabling the works to progress without any impact on patients and staff.

It was a pleasure to welcome the students to the site. Building the new Hospice has been such an interesting project and it has been fantastic to be able to show our future construction workers an operating site and answer any questions. As a former HNC Construction Management student, it has been great to be able to show the students my journey and how I got here. Creating a strong link with the College is something we have been hoping to do and I look forward to welcoming other students later to see the site progress.

Jason Boyle

Site Manager at McLaughlin & Harvey

I’d like to say thanks to Jason for giving our students a fantastic tour. It has been beneficial for them to see operating groundworks on a construction site. As a former student, Jason is an inspiration to current students, showing the progression available within the construction industry. He was very informative and showed his vast knowledge of the site and the construction industry. It’s also good to build strong links with local companies and where possible experience new innovative methods of current build process.

Barry Kerr

Joinery and Construction Technology Lecturer at Ayrshire College