Ayrshire College has inducted another worthy graduate into its Apprentice Hall of Fame.
The Hall of Fame recognises the outstanding achievement of past college apprentices who have made a notable contribution to their organisation.
Cameron Girvan, who has worked with the Housing Assets Service at East Ayrshire Council for almost a decade, becomes the fifth person to be recognised in this way.
The Ayrshire College Apprentice Hall of Fame was established during Scottish Apprenticeship Week 2020, with four former apprentices becoming the inaugural inductees.
Cameron Girvan joins GE Caledonian’s Aidan McIntyre, UPM Caledonian Paper’s Blair Larmour, Wallace McDowall’s Graeme Watson and Wicked Salon’s Leoni Kippen in the Apprentice Hall of Fame.
Ayrshire employers were invited to nominate former apprentices who have acted as role models in their own field and have been an inspiration to current and future college students.
Cameron’s story is one of ambition and resilience.
Cameron attended the Kilmarnock Campus of Ayrshire College to gain experience in the construction industry. After interviews with various companies, East Ayrshire Council saw something in Cameron and hired him as an Apprentice Joiner.
His nomination form quotes an East Ayrshire Council spokesperson saying: “After completing his apprenticeship, and whilst gaining experience of trade, Cameron was keen to progress and initially he applied for the post of Team Leader. He was unsuccessful as he had no experience but gave a great interview and showed potential.
“From there we spoke to him about shadowing with Team Leaders in the Voids sections. This brought no extra money but gained experience of managing people, learning about the business, how things worked within different sections, and being responsible for targets. Throughout this time Cameron demonstrated a positive, hard-working attitude and maturity beyond his years.
“Upon completing his apprenticeship, he felt he had achieved what he wanted to but that he needed another challenge. That’s where the Scottish Fire and Rescue came in. Cameron applied to his local retained station in Muirkirk was accepted and started his development to become a retained Firefighter. This, like his apprenticeship, was hard going, learning new skills over a period of three years until he completed his development and became a Competent Firefighter.
“During his Development at the Fire Service, Cameron began to see the hidden aspects of people’s lives, people struggling and trying to hide what’s really going on. He became interested in suicide prevention, and enrolled in a course where he trained to help deal with people having suicidal thoughts and struggling.
“He helped others by spreading the word around that help is available, and what East Ayrshire Council can offer. After that, he was involved in the ‘Here To Listen’ campaign where he put forward the idea to advertise this initiative on our fleet vans. This has been a real success and Cameron has dealt with multiple people who got the information from our vans.
“Cameron is also in a young employee group headed by our Chief Executive, which helped to move his career forward as he wanted to become a Team Leader. Eventually, Cameron did manage to get this opportunity which he has been doing on a temporary basis for around a year. Gaining this ‘acting up’ Team Leader role meant Cameron is now responsible for his own squad, quality of work, meeting targets and inputting at team meetings whilst being respected by his squad, other Team Leaders and his Manager.
“Cameron is very grateful for where he is and he recently spoke to the 30+ apprentices within Housing Asset Services in the hope that others can hear his story and realise that there is more to achieve if you want it.”