The groundbreaking City Gardens project by Kelson Group is quietly working to bring about positive transformations in urban living. With a strong focus on creating a top-notch, resilient, and secure building for the community, the project goes beyond mere construction. It also seeks to share the invaluable lessons and experiences gained from this ambitious endeavour with future generations. In line with this vision, Kelson Group recently hosted a special tour of the City Gardens site, welcoming esteemed carpentry professors from top institutions across British Columbia.
On June 12, 2023, Kelson Group founder and executive director, Ron Fawcett, and Patrick Brown, Site Supervisor, offered carpentry professors from Northern Lights College, Selkirk College, College of New Caledonia, College of the Rockies, Coast Mountain College, North Island College, Kwantlen Polytechnic University and our very own Thompson Rivers University (TRU) a tour of the City Gardens site.
The tour aimed to give Instructors from around the province an opportunity to inspire and envision how their trades students could benefit from on-site learning.
“If you consider that only a few instructors have had the chance to work on a large-scale site similar to City Gardens, then you realize that exposure to a project of this scale is unique and likely made a long-lasting impression on the TRU students,” said Brown. “On-site learning is something that benefits the students and will hopefully spread to other trade schools around the province.”
After the tour of the City Gardens site, the professors also requested photos and videos of the site, which would later prove to be invaluable teaching aids. These visual resources would enable the professors to bring the construction site directly into their classrooms, offering future students a unique opportunity to immerse themselves in the world of construction and ignite their passion for the trades, even if only virtually.
“I wish I could have seen a site like ours as an apprentice. Hopefully, everyone that participated will be inspired by what TRU’s Carpentry instructors provided their students who visited. If the concept spread to other trade schools around the province, it could impact the construction industry’s future,” Brown said.
