National Construction Week is reaching out to schoolchildren across the country with a series of events designed to inspire young minds
This is National Construction Week. I have always had a soft spot for it. It arose directly from Sir Martin Laing's working group in December 1994, set up in the wake of my Constructing the Team report a few months earlier. For the third year running, the week is being run by the Construction Industry Training Board. It is a great opportunity to showcase construction and in particular to engage with young people looking for a career.

A fortnight ago, in a separate development, the CITB became a sector skills council in partnership with the Construction Industry Council and the Northern Ireland CITB. This change brings with it a new name – CITB-ConstructionSkills – and additional responsibility for encouraging school leavers to join university construction courses as well as undertaking craft training and skills.

At least 1300 young people are expected to take part in the week's events, ranging from site visits to workshops. Early in the week, a group visited building sites in Orkney and at the other end of Britain, Cornwall College is hosting carpentry and joinery sessions for schoolgirls. In 2002, there were 1052 events around the country, more than twice as many as in 2001. This year it looks like a 30% increase in events will be achieved.

This happens at a time of increased interest in the industry. There has been a 10% rise in the number of young people applying for apprenticeships this year. Further education colleges are reporting a strong demands for courses and the skills council has been busy placing young hopefuls with employers. Construction Week allows us to reinforce the message that construction is an exciting and creative industry, and to encourage higher calibre entrants to join it with the promise of equipping them with a highly valued skill. It also enables us to show the full range of opportunities, not just in general building projects (vital though these are) but in areas such as planning, designing, specialist heritage work and high quality interior decorating.

Think of your favourite new building. Did it get as much local TV as the latest unmasked cowboy?

Construction Week is not the only time that the industry addresses the young. CITB-ConstructionSkills has a close involvement with schools through its network of more than 100 curriculum centres. And now CITB-ConstructionSkills area staff in England, and their colleagues in Wales and Scotland, continue to keep in touch with local schools and colleges.

The CITB-ConstructionSkills council's massive advertising campaign has also had a profound effect, and Construction Week itself has a major role. The industry often gets negative media coverage – some of it deserved. But if it does not sing its own praises by drawing attention to the many splendid projects that it completes every month, it cannot expect anyone else to do it. Think of your favourite new building, which you designed or built. Have you publicised it enough? Did it get as much local TV as the latest unmasked cowboy?

Last year I had the pleasure of awarding a prize to pupils from Finchley Catholic Boys school in London, who had won a Construction Week competition to identify a site and design an all-purpose stadium for the London Olympic 2012 bid. I was inspired by the enthusiasm that all the schools that entered the competition showed, and hope that they also have benefited from the experience.

This year we are extending the challenge to all 11- to 14-year-olds throughout the UK in the form of "Creative Spaces". This is a design competition launched at the beginning of Construction Week by celebrity designer Wayne Hemingway, it asks youngsters to redesign a part of their school, and offers to turn the winning entry into reality with £50,000 of building work.