MEGT Group Training is working with Selmar Institute to find a solution to help 450 secondary students continue their Australian School-based Apprenticeship with Melbourne host employers.

MEGT is a quality endorsed Group Training Organisation that has been operating since 1982. The organisation works with schools around Australia, employing secondary school students, placing them with host employers in over 33 industries, overseeing the quality of appropriate vocational education and providing pastoral care.

MEGT is now contacting all schools and employers involved with Selmar Institute.

On Wednesday 7th December MEGT Institute Sydney campus held its annual student Christmas party. With the hospitality room turned into a Christmas wonderland students, staff and trainers all came together to celebrate the end of the student year. There were prizes, M&M guessing competition, food and a particularly intense game of musical chairs which had its fair share of trips and falls!

This event also marked the day of introductions by our Student Council for 2012, welcome to Caterina, Katarina, Gaby, Takashi and Steph! We look forward to seeing great things from you all and continuing events for MEGT students.

A big thank you to all the staff for helping out on the day and setting up this event; Mimi for her wonderful cous-cous, Angela and Carmel for their photography and decorating skills and to Irish and Kristy for making this annual event continue with such success. The students and staff all had such a great time and some well deserved fun.

Merry Christmas and happy new year to all our students from the staff at MEGT Institute Sydney campus. We look forward to seeing our continuing students in the new year and a big congratulations to all our graduating
students we wish you all the success in the future.

As pictures often speak louder than words here are some photographs from the day.

Winners “Pink Pod 1″ from the Training & Assessment Team – Miranda McLean, Sue Ryan, Chloe Amato & Rhiannon Crawford-Haberlin.

A panel of 7 judges decided based on color, uniqueness, design & christmas spirit.

Ben Chifley Scholarships

The Ben Chifley Scholarships are awarded annually to NSW country based 1st year apprentices whose jobs are in jeopardy because of hardship.

Each Scholarship is valued at $5,000 for every year the recipient is completing their apprenticeship up to a maximum of $15,000.

There were ten scholarships awarded in 2011 and Reggie Bolt was one of the winner.

Minister of State for Further Education, Skills and Lifelong Learning John Hayes dubbed IMPACT Apprenticeships ‘innovative and exciting’ at their Loughborough College launch last week.

The Apprenticeship Employment and Training Agency is a joint venture supported by the College and Australia’s leading apprenticeships provider MEGT.

Mr Hayes was one of a number of special guests in attendance at the launch including MEGT CEO David Windridge, Martin Traynor from the Leicester Chamber of Commerce and IMPACT Apprenticeships chairman John Smith OBE.

Speaking at the event, he said: “The combination of the experience of MEGT Australia and the established work of this more than 100 year old college is very exciting.

“In Australia, MEGT are by far the biggest apprenticeship provider. The numbers are quite staggering.

“What this speaks of in terms of that blend of experience is of course impressive, but what it also speaks of is the importance of the concept of an Apprenticeship Training Agency.

“I came to the conclusion very early that the way we would seed apprenticeships across the whole country and every community was through GTAs (Group Training Associations) and ATAs.

“This allows the reach of apprenticeships to go beyond where they have been historically.

“The focus on apprenticeships which MEGT will provide is incredibly important. It is the marriage, the collaboration, the fusion of this college and MEGT that I believe that we can allow the effectiveness of apprenticeships in delivering job-related skills to take us even further than we have travelled already.

“The message I have delivered here is one of absolute confidence in the work of our FE sector, one of real admiration the collaboration you have formed.

“I think it is innovative and exciting and I think it is going to be immensely invaluable to learners, to employers, to our country, to our economy, and to our culture.”

The Minister also talked about the government’s focus on apprenticeships and their value to businesses and learners.

“People say to me, why apprenticeships?” he said, “And I say to them because they are valued by learners, they’re understood by employers, they are a brand which has resonance with the wider community.

“They confirm competencies which are measurable, which add to employability, which feed economic purpose, which allow people to be the best they can be, which deliver a sense of worth and prowess through their acquisition.

“We have as a government made an unabridged, unremitting, unparalleled commitment to apprenticeships.

“Our commitment approach in terms of scale and scope and pace is absolutely unparalleled and unprecedented.

“We have delivered the greatest growth of apprenticeship numbers in the last year ever seen in modern history, we will build more apprenticeships in Britain than we have ever had in the whole of our history.

“The growth is across all ages, it’s across all sectors and it’s all levels. Every part of the country has seen more apprenticeships.”

“We are using apprenticeships both as a route to higher learning with the Level 4 apprenticeships – there are now 2000 plus Level 4 apprenticeships, bearing in mind there were only 200 in 2008-09.

“We will develop Level 5 and Level 6 and I intend to develop a new category called ‘Master Apprenticeships’ at that level.

“We will use apprenticeships as a means of upskilling and reskilling the existing workforce and of course what they have always been, which is a route into employment for those with technical tastes and talents as well as a route for those moving from disengagement to engagement through our access to apprenticeship work.

“We have apprenticeships filling a much bigger space than they ever have before, we’ve made them the pivot of the skills system and that’s why I’m so pleased to be here to support this important initiative.”

On Thursday 1 December, the The Hon Peter Hall MLC, Minister for Higher Education and Skills, Minister responsible for the Teaching Profession handed the keys to a new sustainable house at Selandra Rise in Clyde North to a third year apprentice and cut the ribbon launching MEGT’s Greenhouse project.

The house is one of six affordable homes built under a year-long partnership between MEGT, a not-for-profit organisation and one of Australia’s largest employers of apprentices, Stockland and Porter Davis Homes.

“What could be more fitting to mark the completion of this fantastic affordable housing project
than to be handing the keys to one of the people involved in its construction,” Mr Hall said.

Mr Hall praised the involvement of MEGT, Stockland and Porter Davis Homes, saying the project had resulted in employment for 15 trainees and apprentices in roles as varied as finance, real estate, building and construction.

The project also sets a benchmark for affordable environmental advances in housing construction for the future.

“The Victorian Coalition Government through Skills Victoria provided $100,000 in innovation funding to MEGT to build sustainable and affordable housing and to stimulate ongoing employment within the building and construction industry,” Mr Hall said.

“Each of the houses has been built according to environmental best practice through the use of solar hot water, recycled water for gardens, and the fit-out of smart wiring.

In 2010, MEGT partnered with Stocklands and Porter Davis Homes to pilot a model that would generate employment opportunities for apprentices and trainees. This model needed to be able to be scaled up or down to suit different geographic regions.

Six houses were purchased in Clyde North, Victoria on the Selandra Rise Estate. Learning from the problems of infrastructure and services disconnection faced by some other satellite estates, Stocklands planned the Selandra Rise project with community needs in mind. This was exactly the mindset that was synergistic with MEGT’s plans to create sustainable job opportunities for young people in regions right around Australia.

Fifteen apprentices and trainees have been employed by MEGT and placed with KPMG, Middendorp Electrics, Stocklands and Porter Davis Homes; with more trainees still to be employed for the real estate and financial services businesses connected to the Estate. It is the wide range of skills that makes this project scalable.

Estate building projects cycle tradespeople from house to house. That means only a handful of tradespeople are needed in building a large number of houses. It is when you combine all the industries involved in an estate, that employment for locals becomes sustainable after the houses have been built. While initial apprenticeships and traineeships come from the architects through to analysts, finance organisations and real estate agents, landscapers and the traditional building and construction companies; there are even more opportunities when the Estate is populated by retailers, libraries, sports facilities and schools. The sale of the houses in December 2011 will not therefore be the end of the employment opportunities for the community.

MEGT also assisted one of its apprentices, Michael Belli, in purchasing his first home from the estate.

In December, the project partners will sit down together and talk about the way forward. What were the learnings? What could we do better? Where should we take the model next? It’s important to Australian communities and to the Building and Construction industry that these types of schemes don’t stop with one estate and one region. It’s partnerships that will make them happen.

MEGT would like to acknowledge funding assistance from SkillsVic towards the success of this project.

Minister for Higher Education and Skills Peter Hall will this morning hand the keys to a new sustainable house at Selandra Rise in Clyde North to a third year apprentice who helped build it.

The house is one of six affordable homes built under a year-long partnership between MEGT, a not-for-profit organisation and one of Australia’s largest employers of apprentices, Stockland and Porter Davis Homes.

“What could be more fitting to mark the completion of this fantastic affordable housing project than to be handing the keys to one of the people involved in its construction,” Mr Hall said.

“I congratulate Michael Belli on the purchase of his new home. Michael should feel especially proud to have had a hand in this project and the opportunity to demonstrate the future in affordable sustainable home construction.”

Mr Hall praised the involvement of MEGT, Stockland and Porter Davis Homes, saying the project had resulted in employment for 15 trainees and apprentices in roles as varied as finance, real estate, building and construction.

The project also sets a benchmark for affordable environmental advances in housing construction for the future.

“The Victorian Coalition Government through Skills Victoria provided $100,000 in innovation funding to MEGT to build sustainable and affordable housing and to stimulate ongoing employment within the building and construction industry,” Mr Hall said.

“Each of the houses has been built according to environmental best practice through the use of solar hot water, recycled water for gardens, and the fit-out of smart wiring.

“The Victorian Government continues to support the development of new skills through the Victorian Training Guarantee and it has been a phenomenally successful driver for promoting skills development in Victoria.

“Under the guarantee the Victorian Government has provided subsidised training to record numbers of Victorians to help them acquire the skills they need to secure employment or to improve their current skills base,” Mr Hall said.

On Thursday 24th November, two representatives from Hays Education visited our Melbourne Campus Certificate III in Children’s Services students to provide some information about employment opportunities in Childcare Centres.

They provided some valuable information to the students, including:

• Types of jobs
• Rates of pay
• Benefits of working with a recruitment agency
• The employee’s role
• Hays expectations
• Appropriate presentation
• Taking the next step into employment

The students were very enthusiastic about the opportunity. We would like to give a big thank you to Samantha Meeks, our Children’s Services Co-Ordinator, for organising this event.

Our graduates get jobs

Additionally, two of our current Certificate III in Children’s Services students have just received paid part-time job offers from the Childcare centres where they were completing their work placement. It is fantastic to see our delivery model providing students with employment opportunities