Carshalton Technical Institute opened in October 1954 at a cost of £120K for students aged 15-18 years old.
Originally built for 1200 students the Institute had two departments, Engineering and General Education and Women's Subjects supported by a team of 11 full-time lecturers and 50 part-time staff.
The original faculty picture back row (from left to right): Head, Croft, Davis, Weller, Taylor, Bennet, and Savage. Front row: Miss Appleyard, Ms Dolan, Mr Williams (Principal), Smith, Miss Cameron.
Some of our faculty now, back row (from left to right): Anna Johnson, Nicola Jenner, Anne Rule, Pratibha Patel, Jodie Moore, Nicola Laver, and Steve Miller. Front row: Winsome Aldred, Julie Percival, Sharon Muncie, Nigel Powell and Steve Dixon.
Due to an enormous demand for Further Education, the College was extended in 1960 at a cost of £136K doubling the size of facilities.
The 1960s saw the development of "block release" training schemes the ancestors of today’s Apprenticeship programmes. Students would work while coming to the Institute for one day of training per week. Almost 65 years later, similar schemes still provide young people with access to Further Education.
1970 saw the opening of a £287K extension. The extension was officially opened by Sir Barnes Wallis, the wartime developer of the bouncing bombs. The extension included a new mechanical engineering block, a communal block, which provided a refectory library and student common room and several classrooms as well as a language laboratory. The extension doubled the size of the college to accommodate the 3000 students who attended the college, of which 450 were enrolled on full-time courses.
More recently, our Technology, Engineering and Construction (TEC) Centre, opened in June 2016, a £10million investment to create an amazing learning space.
The TEC Centre was the result of a large construction project to open a modern facility using state of the art sustainable technologies. It consolidates the construction and motor vehicle curriculum areas into one single central location for over 900 students. This striking modern building provides state of the art workshops to deliver the bricklaying, carpentry, electrical, motor vehicle, plastering and plumbing lessons.
Carshalton College is now part of the South Thames Colleges Group, which includes Merton College, Kingston College and South Thames College. Carshalton College is recognised for its strong local presence and its thriving vocational curriculum, especially in construction and creative industry courses.
