Capital Training’s Business Breakfast
- Date October 4, 2018
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On Wednesday 26th September, Capital Training's Business Breakfast was held at Parliament, hosted by the Right Honourable Paul Eagle. Representatives from:
- Red Cross
- Ideas Services
- Skills Highway
- Wellington Boxing Gym
- Porirua City Council
- Primary ITO
- Career Force
- Corrections
- Capital and Coast District Health Board
- Cable Price and Motif attended the breakfast.
The aim of the breakfast was to learn about Capital Training’s Workplace Literacy and Numeracy service.
Capital Training’s Workplace Literacy and Numeracy (WLN) service enables employers to have a highly trained and experienced tutor come to the workplace to upskill their employees in literacy and numeracy. Capital Training has the ability to team up with employers across the country to access TEC’s (Tertiary Education Commission) Employer Led funding.
The business breakfast was in the Great Hall at the parliamentary buildings with around 40 guests in attendance. The morning’s entertainment consisted of a networking opportunity, followed by a range of speakers and breakfast.
The speakers included Makere Derbyshire: Workplace Literacy and Numeracy Manager at Capital Training, Sue Turnbull: General Manager at Capital Training, the Right Honourable Paul Eagle, Wendy Walker: CEO at the Porirua City Council, Anne Alkema: Researcher for Skills Highway and Thomas McLoughlin: TEC Advisor.
The speakers were all poignant and effusive in their support for Capital Training’s Workplace Literacy and Numeracy team. Wendy from the Porirua City Council spoke about the success that her staff have had through receiving Literacy and Numeracy training delivered by Capital Training. Wendy spoke of lives being changed and family dynamics based around education being created in the Porirua area. Wendy’s speech revolved around a gentleman who had received Workplace Literacy and Numeracy training from Capital Training who described the joy of finally being able to read with his daughter (English is his second language).
Anne Alkema from Skills Highway spoke to the overall purpose of Workplace Literacy and Numeracy and the strength of using different methods in education. Her speech included a moving poem by Glenn Colquhoun:
She asked me if she took one pill for her
heart and one pill for her hips and one pill
for her chest and one pill for her blood
how come they would all know which part
of her body they should go to
I explained to her that active metabolites in each pharmaceutical would adopt a spatial configuration leading to an exact interface with receptor molecules on the cellular surfaces of the target structures involved.
She told me not to bullshit her.
I told her that each pill had a different shape and that each part of her body had a different shape and that her pills could only work when both these shapes could fit together.
She said I had no right to talk about the shape of her body.
I said that each pill was a key and that her body was ten thousand locks.
She said she wasn’t going to swallow that.
I told her that they worked by magic.
She asked me why I didn’t say that in the first place.
This poem speaks to the well-known notion that not everybody learns in the same way, which is a notion that the tutors at Capital Training respect. Being able to find ways of engaging those who may not have engaged with education in the past is what they excel at.
Thomas McLoughlin from TEC outlined the amount of available funding for next year, which stands at $4.2 million. This is $4.2 million of quality education time focused on upskilling employees across New Zealand. Together with TEC, that is a lot of potential lives that Capital Training could change through improving literacy and numeracy at the workplace, which trickles in to families and communities becoming more educated.
Before long, the speeches had concluded and prior to everyone dispersing to go to work, a karakia was said and hands were shaken. Numbers were exchanged, and ideas discussed. Capital Training’s business breakfast was a resounding success, appreciated by all in attendance.
