Thirty-five years ago Nelson Mandela told a standing-room-only audience in a gymnasium at a Boston, Massachusetts, high school that “education is the most powerful weapon which you can use to change the world”.

If Mandela—newly released from a South African prison at the time—was correct then the NSW Department of Education, Skills and Employment has just taken a big step towards solving the critical shortage of skilled construction labour.

The Institute of Applied Technology—Construction, an $80-million state-of-the-art facility in Kingswood about 45km west of Sydney’s centre, has been specifically designed to fast-track workers straight into the construction industry.