The Manchester College has opened its first Centre of Excellence in the heart of Manchester’s Knowledge Quarter on Oxford Road. The Manchester College Centre of Excellence for Medical Sciences is the first facility of its kind located on a major teaching hospital site.
The College’s latest campus is based at the Citylabs complex at the old Royal Eye Hospital off Oxford Road and has been developed in partnership with Central Manchester University Hospitals NHS Foundation Trust. The campus’s cutting edge technology provides students with a unique and highly focussed learning experience, which includes live video links to operations as well as direct access to industry specialists based at the hospitals on site.
The Centre of Excellence for Medical Sciences is the first Centre of Excellence to be opened by The Manchester College to address the need for higher level technical skills in priority sectors across Greater Manchester, delivering a specialist provision aligned to current and future skills shortage areas.
Lisa O’Loughlin, Principal, The Manchester College, said: “We are excited to have opened our latest campus dedicated to the medical sciences. Students studying at this Centre of Excellence will gain an experience, through their education, that connects them with professionals already working in the sector and prepares them to become part of Greater Manchester’s growing medical sciences industry. We are building a workforce with the right skills to link them to the priority industries in our region.
“As an organisation we see specialised centres created through collaborative partnerships with employers as a blueprint for the future of further education and higher skills training, which is being reshaped with skills devolution and through area reviews.”
Lisa added: “Every year over 700 people enter higher education via our access programmes, which are specifically aimed at skills shortage areas of the regional economy. The courses in our new Centre of Excellence have been developed with industry specialists, and provide our students with direct links to the talent, technologies, innovations and latest practices right on their doorstep, preparing them for both further university study and work.
