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"I love coming to work."
Chelsea Roberts is loving her electrical apprenticeship, and is working on a new TAFE Queensland facility where future apprentices will train in her trade.
Chelsea Roberts is in the third year of her electrical apprenticeship, which she started after deciding that university study and the job prospects it delivered were not to her tastes. Now working on large-scale commercial projects, she is loving every moment of her burgeoning career.
Chelsea Roberts is enjoying her electrical apprenticeship, which she studies at TAFE Queensland's Ashmore campus.
Having grown up in a family that owned a concreting company, Chelsea always maintained an interest in hands-on careers and basic knowledge of construction tools, processes, and lingo. She said this was a reason that she felt confident as a female apprentice in the male-dominated electrical trade.
“I’m very fortunate that my family had a concreting business growing up, so I was around the trades, knew what to do, knew the lingo, and so I walked straight into it and I haven’t turned back ever since. I’ve loved it, I love coming to work,” Ms Roberts said.
“I catch up for coffee with some of the people from my TAFE classes, we all get along really well. Our TAFE teachers are really good at pairing you up in groups where different people do different types of work, and we can all learn off each other a bit.”
“I think it’d be very hard to choose a trade pathway as a young girl if they’re not surrounded by it like I was. I remember at school in the manual arts subjects, girls who didn’t have family members in the industry had no real understanding or confidence in those subjects,” she said.
Completing her apprenticeship working for large commercial business RPE QLD, Chelsea has the chance to work on major projects including schools and hospitals while completing her Certificate III in Electrotechnology Electrician (UEE30820), and is currently working on the in-construction Robotics and Advanced Manufacturing Centre (RAMC) on the TAFE Queensland Eagle Farm Campus.
The RAMC will include robotics, hydrogen, renewable energy, and electrotechnology workshops, digital labs, learning areas, and staff and student amenities, meaning apprentices training in Chelsea’s trade will be able to see her work on show in their classroom.
“It’s a lot of pressure working on this building because most of the ground floor electrical cabling will be exposed, and classrooms of apprentices and teachers will be able to point out my work as an example every day for years to come, hopefully as a good one!” she said.
Chelsea is one of a number of apprenticescontributing to the new TAFE Queensland facility, including her colleague and fellow Free Apprentice for Under 25s recipient Sinead Mann.