New facility boosts trade training

Bendigo Weekly | Bendigo Weekly | 17-Jul-2012

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The third and final facility of the Bendigo Schools Trade Training Centre was officially opened on Tuesday.

In use since March, the Hospitality Kitchen is hosted by Bendigo TAFE in one of their city campus buildings on Hargreaves Street.

Fitted out as an up-to-date commercial kitchen with work stations for 16 students, the Hospitality Kitchen will be used by a consortium of Bendigo schools.

The consortium "cluster" was awarded $10 million funding under the federal government's Trade Training Centres in Schools Program, announced in 2009.

The Hospitality Kitchen completes the building program, in addition to the traditional trade centre on the old jail site behind Bendigo Senior Secondary College, and an agriculture and horticulture centre on the Junortoun campus of Catholic College.

Chairman of the Bendigo Trade Training Centre steering committee Ken McCulloch said the Bendigo cluster has set the benchmark for collaborative use of education resources.

"There has been the highest level of collaboration between the schools in Bendigo," Mr McCulloch said.

"This amazing teamwork has seen many firsts, including the standardisation of timetables for Bendigo and district students from different schools and allow a range of courses to be delivered that would not previously have been viable if the schools worked in isolation.

"For trade training to flourish in Bendigo local industry has to actively engage with schools and education providers."

Federal Member for Bendigo Steve Gibbons said the collaborative trades centre is a move towards countering the "backward step" that occurred when technical schools were dismantled.

"It's timely that [the Hospitality Kitchen] is in this TAFE building because obviously TAFE is experiencing considerable pressures at the moment," Mr Gibbons said.

"While its future is uncertain, facilities like this will help to embed TAFE here in Bendigo."

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