On Oatridge College
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Oatridge College was established in 1973 on its present site, 15 miles West of Edinburgh at the village of Ecclesmachan, specifically to serve the training and educational needs of farming. More than thirty years on it has diversified and developed to become Scotland's premier landbased College, providing the knowledge and skills required in a broad range of rural industries, from agriculture and horticulture, through environment and conservation, to landbased engineering, greenkeeping, landscaping, animal care and increasingly, equine studies.
The College's Mission is to be recognised as a Centre of Excellence for landbased education, training and enterprise.
During 2006 alone £8.5 million has been invested to provide a state-of-the-art teaching block, new farriery and engineering workshops, phase 1 of the new Scottish National Equestrian Centre, a cross-country riding course, all-weather gallops and new sports fields.
By metropolitan standards Oatridge College is small, with just 400 full-time and 2,500 part-time students, but its role is seen as vital in helping to sustain the fragile rural economy of Scotland and beyond.
Standing in its own 283-hectare estate, in the lush, rolling countryside of West Lothian, the Oatridge College campus includes a commercial, working farm with units for dairy and beef cattle and sheep. One hundred hectares are under cereals. It also houses indoor and outdoor riding schools, with stabling for 50 horses and support facilities, and is perhaps unique in the UK, having its own pay-and-play nine-hole golf course. It is in the heart of the country, but well served by the motorway network and less than a 60-minute drive from most of Scotland's major cities.
Residences with single study bedrooms for up to 200 students mean that the intake covers the whole of Scotland and beyond. Less than half the student population is from the immediate Edinburgh and Lothians area and the College is actively encouraging more applications from urban areas, where school leavers might not normally consider careers on the land.
Oatridge College has a total staff of 120, with the academics divided across three departments: Animal Care and Equine, Engineering and Farriery and Land Use.
The College is an independent further education corporation receiving approximately 50 percent of its funding from the Scottish Executive, through the Scottish Funding Council. The Board of Management oversees an annual budget of approx. £6 million.
Programmes range from access level to Higher National Diploma and include Scottish Vocational Qualifications, recognised and approved by relevant sector bodies. A raft of specialist short courses range from sheep dipping to handling a chainsaw to basic welding.
An impressive 94 percent of all students progress either to jobs or continue their studies in further and higher education. This is well above the sector average of 76 percent. Oatridge is also dedicated to the ideal of lifelong learning.
