Homebuilder marks 100,000th brick donation to colleges across Scotland

Cabinet Secretary and local MSP Jenny Gilruth joins Fife College students to mark milestone donation supporting Scotland’s future builders

Persimmon Homes East Scotland has celebrated a major milestone in its support for construction skills by donating its 100,000th brick to colleges across Scotland.

The landmark moment was marked at Fife College, where Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills and local MSP, Jenny Gilruth, joined students and staff from the construction department to take receipt of the latest 10,000-brick delivery. This latest batch takes Persimmon’s total donation to Fife College alone to 30,000 bricks.

The bricks provide students with the opportunity to learn their trade using the same high-quality materials used on live construction sites across Scotland. The 100,000 bricks are enough to build an entire street of three-bedroom family homes.

Persimmon’s partnership with Fife College was strengthened in 2024 when local apprentice Casey Gardner was recruited as part of the housebuilder’s industry-leading apprenticeship programme, ensuring that more young people in Fife can live, work, and train locally.

Jenny Gilruth, Cabinet Secretary for Education and Skills, said:

“It was a pleasure to join staff and students at Fife College’s Stenton Campus in Glenrothes, to mark this fantastic milestone as Persimmon Homes donates its 100,000th brick to support construction skills across Scotland.

“It was also great to catch up with Casey Gardner, the first apprentice recruited through the partnership between Persimmon Homes and Fife College. This collaboration has gone from strength to strength, helping more young people in Fife to live, learn and work locally, while contributing to Scotland’s growing construction sector.”

William Smith, Senior Regional Apprenticeship Manager at Persimmon Homes East Scotland, said:

“Supporting the next generation of construction talent is at the heart of what we do. By donating these materials, we’re giving students the chance to gain invaluable hands-on experience — building their skills and confidence in a real-world context.”

Jim Metcalfe, Principal of Fife College, said:

“Our award-winning partnership with Persimmon is vital to ensuring skilled workers for our region’s construction industry. It was our privilege to have Jenny Gilruth join us, to mark another wonderful milestone in this story.”

Persimmon Homes, a five-star Home Builders Federation-accredited builder, creates more than 1,500 new energy-efficient homes across Scotland each year. The bricks donated are produced at Persimmon’s state-of-the-art factory in Doncaster, which has a capacity of over 72 million bricks per year — enough to stretch from Fife to Florence, Italy, and back again.

This donation is part of Persimmon’s wider commitment to supporting construction colleges, apprenticeships, and skills development across Scotland, helping to ensure a strong pipeline of qualified tradespeople for the housing sector.