Our skills colleagues have been working in HMP Castle Huntly carrying out CSCS training for the past couple of weeks. Our mentor, Grant, tells us all about the experience in the post below:
“The Skills team has been working with HMP Castle Huntly. Normally the work we do through the prison environment is within closed prisons with prisoners whose sentence is under 4 years, Castle Huntly is an open prison whose prisoners are predominantly long-term prisoners (LTP’s).
We delivered our first CSCS course back in June to 15 prisoners. It was a great course; all the customers really engaged in the course and shared their experiences of working in the construction industry. This type of engagement really helps the trainer when delivering a course and adds a lot of weight to the overall experience of the training sessions. At the end of day 2 of the course the participants sit the first of two exams required to obtain the Green CSCS card which is a level 2 health & safety qualification. The results were brilliant, 2 obtained a full score of 30/30, 5 obtained a score of 29/30, 3 obtained a score of 28/30 and the others ranged from 27 down to the lowest score of 23. For some of these customers this is the first qualification they have obtained in a long time, for others it was the first. Since then the majority of the customers have completed their CSCS exams which gets completed at an external test centre, 12 of the 15 customers have passed the CSCS exam, 11 CSCS cards have been applied for. The other 3 customers will get their tests booked when the time is right for them.
The second CSCS course was delivered on the 9th & 10th of this week. This time we had 11 prisoners attend and again they all engaged very well. On day 2 the customers completed their first exam, and the results were fantastic, from customers obtaining full marks 30/30 to the lowest score being 24/30. One of the customers asked me before the exam starting “has anybody ever failed this”, before I could answer he said, “well I will be failing it today”, he passed with flying colours with a score of 27/30. The smile on his face was fantastic, and I told him never to doubt his ability ever again. All of the participants will get their CSCS tests booked up and I have absolutely no doubts that they will all pass the CSCS test with flying colours.
I have delivered several different types of training courses within a number of closed prisons to a lot of prisoners including, youth offenders (male & female) and adult offenders. Delivering training in an open prison was new experience for me. On the first day of the first course I was asked, “where do I scan my bags”, and was told “we don’t do that here”, I must have had a confused look on my face, because the officer said, “I know, it took me over a year to get used to it” and then laughed.
It was a very relaxed environment, prisoners walked around freely and there was absolutely no tension. Great experience. Looking forward to the next course and hopefully this is the start of a great working relationship with HMP Castle Huntly!”
