Crew give back while learning

A group of male school students are working on a range of projects in the local Karratha community to help develop their trade abilities and vocational skills.

Six Year 11 students from Karratha Senior High School’s Clontarf Academy last week restored the local RSL’s outdoor furniture as part of their certificate two in vocational pathways studies.

Karratha Senior High School vocational teacher Alun Jones said the students spent two days working on the tools and then another half day doing theory each week.

“They’ve named themselves the Karratha Repair Crew and we get work from all the teachers and we’ve got all sorts of things that we’ve fixed up like coffee tables, drawers, barbecues,” he said.

“This is the first job in the community where we have come out and sanded some tables and given them a couple of coats of oil as well. The notion is we try to give back while we are learning.”

Mr Jones said the subject was all about work preparedness.

“It’s basically any sort of trade skills that we can take our hands to ourselves and also about the actual non-work side of being prepared for work like turning up on time, making sure you’re dressed appropriately and using appropriate language and all that sort of stuff and teaching work ethic as well,” he said. Karratha Senior High School student Steve Moloney said he enjoyed the subject and liked being able to do physical work. “It’s pretty fun. You get to learn a lot of life skills and handyman skills,” he said.

“I like being hands on and fixing stuff.”

Karratha RSL Karratha and Districts RSL sub-branch manager Julie Pope congratulated the students on their work and said they did a great job helping restore the outdoor furniture.