UCOL BLOG

Tararua District Mayor Roly Ellis and District Councillors Shirley Hull from Pahiatua and Peter Johns from Woodville spent a morning touring UCOL’s trade training facilities and speaking with students at the Palmerston North campus this week.

“Before my visit, I didn’t fully appreciate the range of the programmes offered at UCOL,” says Roly. “It has first class trade training workshops and equipment. We visited automotive, carpentry, engineering and furniture making and saw classes in action. We also met with some students who travel from Tararua each day to come to UCOL for their studies. I was very impressed with their attitude towards their studies and would like to see more people from Tararua undertake tertiary study at UCOL”.

Getting transport between Tararua and Palmerston North was clearly identified by Roly, Councillors and students as the main discouraging factor to potential students from his region coming to Palmerston North. “Transport is the greatest challenge in getting our young people to UCOL,” he says. “We are actively exploring ways to make it easier and cheaper for students to commute. 

It can cost up to $75 per week for students to travel between the Tararua district and Palmerston North.

“The practical courses would be very appealing to people in the Tararua, we just need to be able to get them here” says Roly.

UCOL Deputy Chief Executive (Strategy) Clare Crawley hosted Councillors during their visit and is keen to consider ways for more Tararua residents to access study at UCOL. “We really appreciated the Mayor and Councillors taking the time to see for themselves what we do here at UCOL and to hear students’ views about what it is like to live in the Tararua and study at UCOL. We have invited them back to UCOL soon to visit and follow up on some ideas.”

Photo: Tararua District Councillors Peter Johns and Shirley Hull with UCOL Automotive student Emma Carter from Woodville, and Tararua District Mayor Roly Ellis.