UHI Argyll (Oban) Update
Argyll and Bute Council · 12 November 2025
Back to Oban Lorn & the Isles Area Community Planning Group — 12 November 2025 and its agenda
Text extracted from the council's PDF. Layout and reading order may differ from the original.
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Principal and Chief Executive: Joe Wright www.argyll.uhi.ac.uk UHI Argyll is a trading name of Argyll College Ltd a charity registered in Scotland No SC026685 Registered address: West Bay, Dunoon, PA23 7HP UHI Argyll – Oban: Update for Oban, Lorn and the Isles Area Community Planning Group 21/10/2025 General The 2025–26 academic year is now well underway, with the majority of centres operating at almost full student capacity. Access-level courses remain in high demand, particularly Access to Care (Level 5), which is currently full. Graduation Our 2025 graduation took place on 26th September at Queen’s Hall, Dunoon. Sixty-five graduates from across Argyll and the islands gathered with family, friends, and staff to celebrate their achievements across Further Education, Higher Education, and Modern Apprenticeships. In addition to celebrating general academic achievement, individual students from Dunoon and Rothesay received special recognition awards: HE Student of the Year (Dunoon), and FE Student of the Year (Rothesay). We were honoured to welcome guest speaker Jenni Minto MSP, Minister for Public Health and Women’s Health, who shared reflections on her career and praised the determination and resilience of our students. Modern Apprenticeship Programme – Employer Engagement Event On Tuesday 28th October 2025, UHI Argyll are hosting a Modern Apprenticeship Employer Engagement Event at the Oban Centre. The session will offer Argyll’s employers the opportunity to explore the benefits of apprenticeships, hear success stories from participating businesses, and connect with UHI Argyll’s Apprenticeships Team for expert guidance on work-based learning. School/ Community Engagement Staff from the Oban centre attended an event at Oban Youth Café in August, offering course advice to school leavers. There will also be representation at Oban’s Job Centre
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Principal and Chief Executive: Joe Wright www.argyll.uhi.ac.uk UHI Argyll is a trading name of Argyll College Ltd a charity registered in Scotland No SC026685 Registered address: West Bay, Dunoon, PA23 7HP Employability Services Fayre on Friday, 24th October as well as at OHS’s MCR pathways information event on Wednesday, 12th November. New short courses We have launched the following short horticulture courses: · 3 Free online taster horticulture courses developed by UHI Argyll Horticulture department, available via the OpenLearn Create website; OLCreate: UHI Horticulture | OLCreate • Plant Biology – 10 hours • Garden and planting design – 15 hours • Plant propagation – 20 hours Additional Horti courses; (not free) · Drystone Walling: (Dunoon) – Starts Thursday 19th February 2026 for 6 weeks (Helensburgh)- Starts Thursday 8th January 2026 for 6 weeks. · Introduction to Garden Design: Online on Monday evenings 6–8.30pm, from 20th October for 13 weeks Commercial courses We are running the following commercial courses: · Elementary Food Hygiene - full day: 11th November; 9th December; 27th January 2026; 17th February 2026 · Personal Licence - full day: 25th November; 11th December; 29th January 2026; 24th February 2026. For more information on our commercial courses, please contact ACBusiness@uhi.ac.uk