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Big W Retail Awards

More than 80 Big W employees from across Victoria graduated in a recent ceremony

By Eimear McNelis - 1st August 2002 - Back to News

A mother and son team from Melbourne’s western suburbs have paired up to take out two of this year’s top retail training awards for Big W and regional training provider, GippsTAFE.

Scott Yee from Big W’s Broadmeadows store received an Excellence Award, and Karen Yee from Big W’s Sunshine store received an Encouragement Award after each completed a Certificate II in Retail Operations.

More than 80 Big W employees from across Victoria graduated in a recent ceremony held at Monash University in Clayton.

The graduation marked the end of the first year of an innovative new training program, for retail workers employed by Big W stores in Melbourne, Bendigo and Shepparton.

The trainees undertook the course as part of a new Big W Retail Training initiative developed conjunction with GippsTAFE in Victoria, and Wide Bay TAFE in Queensland.

The course was interactive, practical and very enjoyable. The retail course aimed to introduce topics and issues in the most inventive and interesting ways and integrate the workplace into all aspects of the learning.

All training occurred within stores, taking advantage of Big W’s excellent training facilities.

Certificates were presented to the students by Ms Paddy Nicholls, CEO of GippsTAFE, and Mr William Hill, Regional Manager of Big W Discount Stores (Victoria and Tasmania).

Mr Hill congratulated all the graduates and acknowledged their achievements and the hard work they put into their training.

Mrs Nicholls said "It was extremely gratifying to see the results of our partnership with Big W and Wide Bay Institute of TAFE. Both the partnership and the model of delivery have ensured quality, focussed training experiences for Big W’s Victorian workforce."

"Big W is to be commended for the initiative and their commitment to staff and training."

Michael Taylor from ANTA (Australian National Training Authority) was also there on the night and said "ANTA is pleased to be able to assist this innovative national partnership between Big W, TAFE and Government to provide work based New Apprenticeship pathways to both existing workers and school-based trainees."

Nicole Sinclair from Big W’s Southland store also received an Excellence Award, and Chris Grant from Big W’s Endeavour Hills store received an Encouragement Award.

Source: http://gippsland.com/

Published by: news@gippsland.com

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