Blue Collar Proud

The Age

Saturday November 29, 2008

Josh Jennings

FOR Chisholm Institute of TAFE mechanical trade teacher Leigh Harris, teaching at TAFE is all about returning the favour. And that favour is providing others with the assistance and guidance he received at the institution along the way to becoming a qualified tradesman.

"I get people coming in that are machine operators that want to upskill," he says. "In engineering that's quite low down the food chain, so to speak, so I enjoy training the guys or girls up and seeing them get a better job."

When Mr Harris started the teaching post about four years ago, he says the mechanical engineering trade was "copping an absolute belting" because the perception was that it was a "dirty" blue-collar job.

Entering a TAFE teaching role wasn't something he could do without making sacrifices, either.

"I took a stand and said I'd take a pay cut going into TAFE and just try to better the trade," he says.

To etch out a career in teaching, he did post-trade training in fluid power and industrial automation, a certificate IV in training and assessment and a diploma of vocational education training.

Today, he is secretary of the Victorian Engineering TAFE Teachers Senate.

"I look after the administrative side of the organisation, which is basically a group of TAFE teachers who volunteer to get together to discuss matters such as changes to the curriculum, how to improve the trade and better ways of training."

He also co-ordinates on-site training for big industry employers such as GM Holden and consults to companies such as SMC Pneumatics and Omron Industrial Automation. This makes him an important link between industry, government and training organisations and gives him the insight to help place students in jobs.

Recently he accepted the Institute for Trades Skills Excellence's Australian Mechanical Trade Teacher of the Year award during the Manufacturing Skills Australia conference.

"There were very strict criteria that had to be followed that I was able to address, which were all about engaging young people and using electronic learning resources such as the internet to do so," he says. "I believe they interviewed a couple of industry partners that I work for and got their opinion; I know that I was also told that I was somebody a company could bank on for furthering their development and if they needed the job done I was the man to talk to; I wasn't expecting that but that came from GM Holden."

Although he's no accolade hunter, he says winning the award was one of his biggest career achievements.

"I'm going to use it positively to encourage young people coming into the industry to realise there's light at the end of the tunnel and it's not a dead-end job," he says.

As part of his award, Mr Harris receives money to develop a relevant industry project. He says he's still brainstorming the project but is interested to sink his teeth into something that debunks the myth that trades are dirty jobs. And he wants to play a big hand to improve industry training.

"We're going through a radical change in the industry where the financial bite has a flow-on effect," he says.

"I want to try to help industry to adapt training to suit more modern needs; each month training needs change for a company and to be able to keep up with that is one of my goals.

"I want to stay current and better enhance our tradesmen of today." -- JOSH JENNINGS

© 2008 The Age

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