Month: June 2017

Interview with Darrel Glessing, Firefighter. How long have you been a firefighter in Geelong?

I started out as a volunteer firefighter in the CFA with the @Highton Fire Brigade in 2000 when I first moved to Australia from America. I’d been a volunteer firefighter in the small American town that I lived in, which was a great way to get involved and give back to my community. Joining the Highton brigade was a way for me to give back to my new Australian community as well as get to know some people.

In January 2002, I left my secondary teaching profession to embark on a new journey as a professional firefighter with the CFA. I was first posted to Ballarat City Fire Brigade and worked there for 4 years. In 2006, I was successful in obtaining a position as a firefighter at the Belmont Fire Brigade in Geelong. In the first year and half I worked at all three professional stations (Belmont, Geelong City, and Corio). In July 2007, I passed my leading firefighter assessment and was promoted. This role involved ensuring truck checks, equipment inventories, station cleaning and maintenance are done to a professional level. I’m also responsible for organising training for our shift, which takes up to half of our day. This training includes structural firefighting, wildfire firefighting, hazardous materials incidents, motor vehicle accidents and rescue, and now emergency medical response to support Ambulance Victoria where the individual is not conscious and not breathing. This might mean we are the first to the scene at SIDS, heart attack or stroke incidents. Our roles in the emergency services are ever expanding.

Continue reading “Firefighter, Darrel” →

So how did Barrie Hawkins of Highton become responsible for enabling communities in Vanuatu to secure supplies of clean water? He studied Civil and Mechanical Engineering at the Gordon. He then enjoyed a long career at Ford, building and equipping large manufacturing plants, mostly in Australia but he spent 2 years in Taiwan and 2 years in Vietnam. Barrie served his community as a Councillor on the Shire of South Barwon (until being posted overseas) and has been a member of the Rotary Club of Belmont for nearly 40 years.

A key step before you can build a factory etc. is preparing the economic case to secure funding for the project.  Barrie honed his skills doing this in the highly competitive Ford environment.

After retirement Barrie became involved with Australian Business Volunteers, an organisation supported by the Australian Government providing “business skills” to companies, universities and not-for-profit organisations overseas. He spent time in Fiji, Vanuatu, PNG and Laos training various groups in modern business techniques, including how to secure funding for their projects.

Continue reading “Water supply to communities in Vanuatu, Barrie.” →

Jeff has been volunteering with CREST for 36 years. CREST stands for Citizens Radio Emergency Service Teams, they support the community through communications. ‘We are all dedicated volunteers who assist the community through the use of two way radios. We provide a link between the scene of an emergency and the emergency services. I’m the Australian National Director and CEO for CREST Victoria. https://www.facebook.com/CREST-Australia-Inc-102458699875642/

‘In late 1975 a group of friends in NSW and Victoria could see the need to link calls from truckies CB radios to emergency services. They brought this issue to the attention of the Government and by the end of ’76, CREST began. Between 1976 – ‘95 there were bases in every State and Territory receiving around 30,000 calls each year. The volunteers at CREST were saving lives.

Continue reading “CREST, Jeff” →

What inspired you to start The Workers Hut?

David and I (Rebecca) both worked from home and we wanted to get people out of their garages and bring them together to help inspire each other and grow their ideas. It’s so easy to get distracted by the washing, the kids, the pantry, and the madness at home that we wanted an alternative for people without forking out big bucks on commercial office space.

Tell us about The Workers Hut and your involvement?

We created The Workers Hut to provide a flexible working space for freelancers, start-ups and mobile professionals. We wanted people to have a local flexible desk option, be able to run a meeting or join a webinar in the Melbourne office, run a business event and build their network without leaving the Surf Coast. The hut is at 17 Baines Cres. Torquay. www.workershut.com/en

Continue reading “The Workers Hut, Rebecca” →

‘There was one guy who hadn’t been out of his house since 2003.’ We hear from Peter, who has been working in disability service for 13 years, about Alternative Aspect Media. ‘The guys are the main thing. I work on helping people with their NDIS plans and saw a need for the socially isolated.

‘Initially we started with three guys who all had similar interests: watching Youtube, games, websites, software and coding.

‘I said I’d be happy to help them enhance their skills, but we had to meet in town. This got them out of their comfort zones. The guys do 95% of the work and learn from their mistakes. We’ve been running 27 weeks and in that time 2 of the guys have gone on to find work.

Continue reading “Alternative Aspect Media, Peter” →

‘Do it now!’ It is not uncommon when reaching middle-age to take up a much-desired hobby. It is rare when that decision leads to international fame and you find yourself, aged 54, feted as one of the best contemporary portrait artists in the world. Janne Kearney is one such artist. Her oil painting, titled ’86 (Australian rhyming slang for ‘worth nix’) has been shortlisted for the prestigious 2017 BP Portrait Award held at the National Portrait Gallery in London. Selected from 2,580 entries from artists representing 87 countries, the BP Award is judged by revered art critics and considered ‘the Oscars of portraiture’. Janne’s work will be viewed by hundreds of thousands when the exhibition tours the UK. The selected top three artists will share the prize money of (almost) $105,000 AUD.

Remarkably, Geelong artist, Janne, a photorealist painter, is self-taught. She doesn’t hold a formal arts degree and began studying portrait painting eleven years ago, at the age of 43.   An ‘underprivileged’ Norlane girl, with a flair for drawing but few options to explore her talent, Janne drew on butcher’s paper carefully hoarded by her mother. When she was nine her mother died. At 16, while still at Corio Tech, she left an ‘abrasive’ home life to live with her future husband, Mick. Janne applied to Ford Motors for an apprenticeship in painting and decorating. Initially she didn’t warrant an interview but after excelling in the entry exam she was grudgingly accepted.

Continue reading “Janne Kearney, Artist” →