News

Over the past few months, the College has been victim to numerous vandalism attacks, predominantly on the front oval. Our Year 11 VET Furniture students were very concerned about this and suggested ways that we could avoid future vandalism. Some students proposed the idea of a fence that runs along the length of the driveway, creating a barrier between the oval and the driveway from the entrance, all the way to the gym carpark. In one of their VET lessons, students started designing a post that would be decorative, but also a deterrent to the vandals.

After receiving approval from College management to go ahead with the project, the Year 11 students came up with a design and cost to install the fence. They initially installed a couple of posts to test the concept and to learn the ins and outs of alignment, leveling and plumbing of a post.  After the digging of six holes by hand, the concept design was agreed upon and the students organised to install the rest of the posts over one single day. This involved hiring a dingo and auger and with the assistance of the Grounds Team, students drilled the remaining 40 holes and installed the posts in a short space of time.

One small group of students utilized the auger and drilled the holes that were required, while three groups of students placed posts in between the already set posts.  The students improved with their tasks throughout the day and worked extremely well as a team. In the end, all students took responsibility for each of the following jobs over the day:

• Measuring location of the posts
• Used an auger and shovels to dig holes for the posts
• Used a string line to line up each post to the same height
• Used a level to check for plumb of each post
• Used various gardening equipment to fill and tamp the earth around each post
• Clean up the area in preparation for the turf to recover

Well done to all of the Year 11 students involved in this fantastic initiative; Josh Adams, Dallas Brabham-Waye, Jaidyn Carlson, Charlie Fisher, Alex Harkness, Louis Merrett, Harrison Porter and Will Wittwer. The skills they have learned and the ability to work as a group will stand these students in good stead when it comes to understanding of construction and employability skills.

Trent Eitzen | VET Furniture Teacher

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