Block paving course

[loudog]

Hi i am a self taught paver with 25 years in the tarmac and paving game, but would like to get a certificate behind me as in this day and age with people being more jubiouse i think it would be a good idea. don't want to do year course or anything like that just a week or a few days would be great. Tony was involved with one but since reading about it, he has pulled out as the instructors don't seem to know what they are doing. any help would be great
Cheers lads & females

[seanandruby]

i don't know of any. But like most of the people on here, they don't have certs' either. You sound like you have served your time ( grandad rights ) and know the crack. With the help of this site and the guys who post up, i'm sure you will be fine. Make sure you keep a portfolio of your work that you can use. Word of mouth is as good as it gets, so carry on doing things to compliance. Good luck.

[lutonlagerlout]

same boat as yourself lou,got 7 O'levels and started work as an electronic technician,
hated every second of it and went on the buildings
I vote for experience over paper any day
LLL

[jonnyboyentire]

Same here, I don't think it matters if you can build a good portfolio of work. The "tickets" I have relate to my time as a sales manager/area manager of an insurance office chain.....

If you're worried about how to get recognised above all the rest, you could try registering with Checkatrade.com - costs £5-700 per year but they operate a proper feedback system so if your work is good you'll get the recognition. Coupel of my mates are on there and swear by it, they've recently set up on their own.

[michaelthegardener]

ive got a bit of paper that says im a gardener :p never done me any harm haveing it never done any good either
im with everyone else on here if ya can do a good job thats better than haveing a bit of paper

[seanandruby]

Have you tried citb, maybe they can put you in touch with somebody?

[lutonlagerlout]

my biggest concern with courses is that half the course is HSE stuff
what people really need is hands on training and assessment
written work is a waste of time because the most writing you do on site is the lottery numbers
LLL

[seanandruby]

my biggest concern with courses is that half the course is HSE stuff
what people really need is hands on training and assessment
written work is a waste of time because the most writing you do on site is the lottery numbers
LLL

Still need to be up on H&S for on big sites.

[Tony McC]

Four years ago, the Hard Landscape Training Group (HLTG) set out to create some proper recognition of skills in the paving trade, and we ran a shedload of courses during 2007 that offered basic training and certification in blocks, flags and kerbs.

Then some people started playing politics and the training for paving was stopped and supplanted with courses on those other essential hard landscaping skills such as chain saw maintenance, weedkiller application, and abrasive wheels training. I said my piece at the Training Group but, for reasons I've never understood, it was deemed more important to give the appearance of training lots of people on these peripheral one-day courses than to actually train people in genuine paving skills, in order that the grant from Construction Skills (what used to be the CITB) was kept flowing and the administrators kept receiving a generous salary.

There was talk of setting up a EWPA scheme, which is a one-day assessment scheme of Experienced Workers to assess whether they are 'tradesman' standard. A couple of us volunteered to get the necessary qualifications to become assessors, but nothing came of it.

Then, in 2008, CS said they wanted an apprenticeship for the paving trade, and after effing about for 18 months, looking for anyone other than that loud-mouth Tony McCormack to create the course, the administrators gave in and got me to write the course with a deadline of the end of September 2009. The resulting course was duly accepted by CS. The scheme was to be piloted by the end of 2009 or very early 2010 at the latest.

A local authority Highways Department some 20 miles from here offered to put their 6 apprentices onto the scheme, and negotiations to source help from a local college to provide classroom facilities took place, while the practical training sessions would be done in the local Council Yard. Brilliant! Real training at last!

Then the administrators stepped in again and within weeks, the deal was off. To this day, the LA concerned is not aware of why the scheme did not go ahead. The administrators from the Training Group have never had the courtesy to speak directly to the Highways Dept Contract Manager who was looking after the council end of the deal and he has no idea why his offer to put 6 young lads into training was ignored.

Not to worry, says the HLTG, we are going to run the course in Milton Keynes, a mere 180 miles from where the trainer lives, and we have a classroom and a yard and a set of candidates. The course is going to start in the second week of June, so get your act together, McCormack, and make sure you're available to lead the course.

I gave up most of May and the first week of June to create lesson plans, presentations, diagrams, lecture notes, practical sessions and everything else that would be needed to run the course. Three days before the course was due to start, I'd heard nowt from the administrator, so called to find out what was happening.

The course was off, and, due to illness, the administrator had failed to let me know. No explanation, no phone call to let me know what was happening, just blank faces and five weeks of my life wasted, and all for zero income.

Last week, more than three months after the non-event, I get an email saying that, due to the lack of interest, the course would not be running for now and there would be no meeting of the HLTG as there was nowt to discuss.

So: according to those that have been drawing a very nice salary from CS for the last 4 years, there is no demand for training and we are just wasting our time trying to offer it. In essence it's *your* fault for not taking up the opportunity when it was put in front of you.

What do you mean you didn't know anything about the apprenticeship or the other training courses? Didn't you see all the adverts in the trade press, on this website, from the manufacturers, in the Builders Merchant? Oh - that's right! There never was any effective promotion of the courses. The administrators were relying on interested parties contacting them to enquire about training, rather than reaching out to contractors to ask if they wanted any training, although they did spend 5 grand on a booth at Glee which resulted in......no training.

So: it's all the contractor's fault that there is still no effective and recognised training for the paving trade. Half-a-dozen courses are written and ready to go, the apprenticeship scheme has been approved, there are qualified assessors waiting in the wings, but there is no interest from the trade, allegedly.

Which is strange, because I have dozens of emails from people just like Loudog asking for training in block laying, flags, blacktop, setts, kerbing, drainage, setting out....all the topics for which courses were created but never enacted, because it was easier to send lads and lasses onto weedkiller training for a day than to arrange week-long training stints, and, at the end of the day, the pay is the same whether you train one or one hundred.

Our trade needs proper training and recognition of the skills that many of us have. A training group was set up to enable such training and recognition but, over the last 3 years, it has completely failed to do anything other than become a talking shop that runs up five-figure expenses while training no-one.

If there are any developments, I'll try to announce them on this website, but I won't be holding my breath. The HLTG is duty bound to hold an AGM next Spring and it would be no surprise at all if there is no progress on anything at all until then.

Very, very sad.

[lutonlagerlout]

its a effing disgrace
i did a 4 day course a couple of years ago to become an A1 assessor for bricklaying apprentices

anyway waited for the next stage to start and got a letter from the people running the subsidised course
"dear sir we are no longer continuing with the A1 assessor course but the training you have received is valued at £2350 +VAT"
basically they had me and another lad in a classroom and they were getting £500 a day to talk to us knowing full well that once they had done 100 of these sessions they would be banking near quarter of a mill of taxpayer's hard earned cash

the problem for me and most contractors is that on site you cannot afford to let people have a go and time and cost constraints make it hard to take time to teach people effectively
I 'm sure most blokes on this forum never trained as pavers,you just kind of fall into it
LLL

[seanandruby]

They basically used you to make money for themselves. You have every right to be annoyed at those bodies. All the big firms where making hundreds of thousands of pounds to put the likes of me through NVQs. I had to show a few lads some basics for them to get through. There where storemen, sweeperupers, lorry backeriners, allsorts getting NVQs on evidence i had done, fecking maddening. Some of these lads could hardly speak English, all of a sudden they are "experienced drainlayers" etc:Takes the piss a bit :O

[loudog]

Well thank you all for your comments, and thanks Tony for your comment. To me, this is what life has become, Health & safety! yes good to have it but some of it is just covering asses. Nvqs yes good to have but really, can't beat hands on. Ok lads back to the drawing board. Great site used for many years.

[ilovesettsonmondays]

i did city and guilds roadwork craft years 1 and half of year 2 many years ago when i was an apprentice.i got my n vq through bardons a few years ago .,not worth doing in my opinion .as sean says a money spinner .we were telling the labourers what part of the slab to hit with the maul .ten minutes later they are all flaggers

[loudog]

I know you are right, experience counts for everything but as you know, in this job, you meet all sorts of people, Some are difficult to win over, you show them your book with your photos in (they say anyone could go round and take photos) you tell them you have 25 years experience ( prove it) you tell them you get a guarantee ( prob not worth the paper its written on) i have had it all. lol

[London Stone Paving]

Tony

Sounds like you put a hell of a lot of effort into designing that course.
In order for the course to be credible and recognised would the government need to be involved or it could it be taken up by private organisations?
The hard landscaping/groundworks industry is crying out for something like this in my opinion