College course for Mill Green jobs
Students will be transported from the classroom to the shop floor as a college course tailor made to fill more than 1,000 jobs at a multi-million pound shopping centre is set to launch.
South Staffordshire College will launch a retail and merchandising course this September to ensure that jobs created by the Mill Green Designer Outlet Village can be filled by people from the area.
The development will open in 2019, bringing with it 1,200 jobs and the one year course will run at the college’s Lichfield campus, enabling students to gain a Level 2 qualification in retail.
The £115m site will be home to 132 high end shops and restaurants, and job opportunities will range from assistant to managerial positions.
Graham Morley, chief executive of South Staffordshire College, said: “The opening of the Outlet Village is a fantastic opportunity for people to find employment in the Cannock area, which has been lacking in development in recent years.
"We want to ensure that people from within our community are in the best possible position to secure the 1,200 jobs that are going to be made available.
“A career in retail can offer a surprisingly good salary as well as an array of different disciplines to move between.
"It allows people to identify their own niches, whether this be in sales, visual merchandising, or logistics, in areas such as fashion, sport, and technology.
"Moreover, the outlet village will be home to many big name brands that have clear routes for career progression in place.
“The retail course provides a means for students to fast track their careers, as they can enter the workplace already knowing where their particular strengths and interests lie, and pursue that from the outset.”
An initial 80 retailers will mark the opening of Mill Green in Summer 2019, with an additional 50 outlets set to open in 2021, in a second phase of development.
