Christmas has come early for Cobram Secondary College in the form of a 390-piece limited edition 100-year anniversary tool kit presented to them by Repco’s Cobram manager Carlo Ruggi.
The tool kit was presented to Year 8 student Noah Beurs, Year 10 student Tyren Francis and automotive teacher Craig Hunt on Wednesday, November 23 and will be used by the automotive class.
Mr Ruggi was a former student at Cobram Secondary College before becoming a mechanic and then a manager at Repco in Cobram.
He heard about the college’s automotive classes initially via Facebook and then saw a photo of the donated Honda HRV 18 in the Cobram Courier.
For Mr Ruggi, it brought back memories of his own automotive classes while at school and he wanted to help out.
“I would just rather see the students enjoy it,” Mr Ruggi said.
He sees automotive classes as important, as it gives students who don’t want to participate in academic classes a chance to experience practical learning.
Noah, who was present for the handover, is one of the lucky students to take part in the automotive classes.
For him, the idea of becoming a mechanic is one that he is thinking about and his dad inspired him to take up the class.
“My dad works on cars a lot and he normally gets us kids to help out,” Noah said.
According to Noah, the automotive classes, which teach a mixture of practical and theory, are quite popular with male and female students.
Cobram Secondary College intends to build on its current automotive classes and offer VET automotive classes in 2024.
Cobram Secondary College principal Kimberley Tempest is absolutely thrilled with the generous donation.
“This is a brand new program. And so start-up is quite expensive,” Ms Tempest said.
And so to have that support from Repco, but also our local community just makes a world of difference.”
Ms Tempest said the automotive classes were part of a push to make the students as job ready as possible and the future VET automotive program was part of a plan to take education at the college to new heights, while linking it to real world and industry experience.
“We are really just sort of taking it up to the next level.”
The college currently provides VET courses in Community Services, Engineering, Agriculture and Sport and Recreation with Certificate II in Cookery starting in 2023.