May 6, 2014
Year 12 students from Murgon and Kingaroy State High Schools and St Mary’s Catholic College travelled to Cherbourg’s Ration Shed Museum on Tuesday morning to attend the town’s first-ever Careers Day.
The event was an initiative of the Cherbourg Aboriginal Shire Council, designed to showcase future career options and encourage the students to think about their future prospects more broadly.
Cherbourg elders and community leaders began the day by talking frankly about their lives and careers, encouraging the students to “seize every opportunity” to advance themselves.
Respected local educator Eric Law told the students that although he knew he wanted to be a teacher at the age of five and had enjoyed a 42-year career in teaching, he’d spent some of his early years in the Army and had never regretted the training and discipline it provided.
He told the audience that times had changed since he was a young man. These days there was a much greater emphasis on building skills, he said.
Cherbourg CEO Warren Collins confided that he had begun his working life at a cattle station before moving on to work at a Brisbane muffler fitting shop.
Then he had tried his hand at farming, dairying and piggeries, and worked in a general store before he joined Cherbourg Council 30 years ago.
He stressed to the students that it was important to find work they were good at and enjoyed.
Aunty Ada Simpson and Sandra Morgan from The Ration Shed shared the stories of their own lives with the audience, and were followed by Jacquie Tapau from Gundoo Day Care, a self-confessed “former high school drop-out” who had gone on to run the town’s child care centre after considerable post-school training at TAFE and ultimately university.
Sheree Strauss, from Yurri Muntha Cafe and Catering, talked to the students about her own career in the hospitality industry and the positives of the industry, even though her training was interrupted by a decade so she could raise three children.
“If you’re reliable, responsible and have a good attitude you have most of the important qualities that good employers want,” she said.
“But you’ll do really well if you expand your knowledge through training.”
Edwina Stewart told the students her parents had encouraged her to take up nursing as a career, so she took their advice and pursued it for seven years before finally realising that it wasn’t her calling.
But when she joined Cherbourg Council she discovered she had a natural affinity for bookwork and office administration, and had happily followed that career ever since.
Alzira Conlon shared stories of her trips around the world – first as a worker at the former Department of Aboriginal Affairs in Canberra, and then with the World Health Organisation – before returning to Cherbourg 18 years ago as a health worker.
She said her amazing life came about because after leaving high school at 16, she decided to go to Business College when she was 23 to pick up extra skills.
That education led to her securing a job in Canberra, and a lifetime of travels that flowed from that.
These talks were then followed by presentations from several of the day’s exhibitors, and then a community lunch.
Careers Day exhibitors included the Armed Forces Recruitment Team, Nurunderi TAFE, South Burnett CTC, Centrelink Indigenous Services, Yurri Muntha Cafe and Catering Service, the Indigenous Youth Mobility Program and Sero Learning.
|
|
|
