Source: Reserve Bank of Australia
20 May 2025
TAFE NSW Ultimo in the heart of central Sydney delivers the state’s only Marine Mechanical Cert III alongside qualifications in marine engineering, in a purpose-built onsite marine craft construction education facility.
The Ultimo campus, originally opened in 1891 as the new home of Sydney Technical College on the lands of the Gadigal People of the Eora Nation and represents New South Wales’ first government owned and built vocational education facility. Today its NSW’s largest TAFE campus consisting of heritage buildings from the 1890s with newer buildings built through the 20th century to support expanding educational offerings and the growing number of students. The campus encompasses structures including the former Technological Museum (1893), Turner Hall (1892) and Commercial High School (1892), and the separate George Street-located Marcus Clark Building (1913), which was acquired in 1966.It seems fitting that mechanics remains an important offering on campus, considering Sydney Technical College was initially established in 1878 as a partnership between the Sydney Mechanics’ School of Arts, the Trades and Labor Council of New South Wales, the Engineering Association of New South Wales Trades, and supported by government. When the government decided to fully fund the college in 1883, it became the birthplace of TAFE as we now know it – a statewide system of technical education. Today TAFE NSW continues its public vocational education mission. When visiting the Ultimo campus in February, NSW minister for Skills, TAFE and Tertiary Education Steve Whan said: “The maritime industry is crucial to our economy and TAFE NSW plays an important role in ensuring the next generation of seafarers and mechanics have the skills to succeed.”
Navigating the Waves
Simon Rodgers is acting head teacher, Mechanics at TAFE NSW Ultimo. He looks after marine mechanics, motorcycles and auto electrical and is the first marine mechanic to head the department. Rodgers has been teaching at TAFE NSW for 20 years and began his career as a marine mechanic apprentice, learning at TAFE NSW alongside automotive apprentices as the marine mechanic qualification wasn’t yet available. “I grew up on a farm, so we were just into motorcycles and boats and tractors and things like but when I started my apprenticeship, that’s when my formal training started,” he says. “When I was at school, I loved mechanics and a lot of my friends were getting into automotive and I saw that as there was so many people doing it that I didn’t want to do it, I wanted to do something unique and I was lucky enough to secure a marine apprenticeship.” “I started my apprenticeship as a marine mechanic in 1988 and worked with that company for just under 10 years. [Then] I had an opportunity to start my own business.” After 10 years running his business, one of his boating industry representatives mentioned a TAFE NSW teaching role and he decided to look into it and found it offered him the flexibility to spend more time with his young family. After 10 years running his business, one of his boating industry representatives mentioned a TAFE NSW teaching role and he decided to look into it and found it offered him the flexibility to spend more time with his young family. He went through the TAFE NSW teacher training program at the time, where he taught at TAFE on a reduced program and went to university to earn a BA in Adult Education: “Working in industry with your hands for 15–20 years and then having to go and sit in a classroom and write essays, it was very difficult, but what I have noticed is the teaching skill set that I gained through that process has benefited me.” He hasn’t looked back, discovering he truly loved being a TAFE teacher. “My philosophy is that I don’t try and drag them up to where I’m at with my experience is, I let them know that the only difference between the students and myself is time in the saddle,” he says. “So I like to get down to their level, interact with them and just teach them stuff. “Probably my best teacher was my stepfather and he always explained to me, it doesn’t matter how much you learn or whatever you do, if you don’t pass it on it gets lost. I’ve got to pass the baton on.”
Passing the Baton
Marine mechanics has been offered at Ultimo since 1997 when the marine specialist facility opened. “We get to concentrate on three main things in our qualification: engines, electrical and propulsion systems and we probably do more than most other disciplines around those three topics,” he says. “Our qualification is incredibly diverse. We’ve got specialist teachers that represent most of the industry – we all have unique skill sets and we program those skill sets around the subjects to best suit the apprentices.” “We’ve been able to restructure the course delivery in Stage Three to run two separate streams so that we can have the heavy diesel people concentrating on their discipline and the petrol people concentrating on theirs.” “You can engage any employer, any engine manufacturer and they really respect what we do at TAFE and how we train our apprentices.” “There are apprentices who have sat in our classroom who now work for engine manufacturers, we’ve had apprentices travel throughout Europe working on superyachts and many of the students that we’ve taught in the past are now running their own business and sending their own apprentices here.” “It’s a very family style of business, very generational, we’ve got one current employer who’s got his third child coming through.”
Family Legacies
That third child is the younger brother of Michaela Douglas who recently completed her Marine Mechanical Technology apprenticeship at TAFE NSW Ultimo last year, before winning the Boating Industry Association’s Apprentice of the Year award. “I am a third-generation qualified marine mechanic,” says Douglas. “I work for my family’s business Douglas Marine; and we’re based on Pittwater out of the Royal Prince Alfred Yacht Club. My grandparents started the company, then my dad and his brother worked in the business, and now me and my two brothers are in the business and my sister was also working in the office while she was at uni.” “The teachers, they’re great. If you put the effort in, they will put double the effort in, they really want to help you.” “They have really good facilities. They start in the morning teaching you the theory. And then you’d go into the workshop and actually pull apart whatever you’re learning about… and learn how to put them back together.”
Lifelong Learning
Following the completion of her Cert III, on the recommendation of her teacher Simon Rodgers, TAFE NSW nominated Douglas for Boating Industry Australia’s Apprentice of the Year award. She won both the NSW and Australia wide Apprentice of the Year. Now fully qualified, she’s loving her work, especially the variety it offers: “I enjoy explaining to someone why [what I’ve done is] important… it’s always different.” Douglas is now studying Automotive Electrical Technologies to support her marine mechanic work.
Building and Sharing Knowledge
TAFE NSW marine construction teacher Robert Reid is a shipwright by trade and has been teaching full time at Ultimo since 2018. “I kind of needed to share,” he says of his transition from industry to teaching. “Thinking back, as a kid sailing, I was kind of always instructing… and as a foreman at work, I was showing others how to do things.” Reid says TAFE is about more than technical instruction: “TAFE is about access, support, and being able to come in and learn all the [skills] and the mechanics behind the visual.”
Nurturing Initiative
“When things start to click for them, things they couldn’t do before… when they’ve brought in their own initiative.” “There’s close ties to industry… the apprentice’s bosses came through TAFE and they want the same skills demonstrated.” “We’ve been able to tie in Cert IV from this year, which is set up for fabrication and welding units and for bidding for contracts.”
Smoother Sailing
Maddison Webb-Leck, Certificate III in Marine Craft Construction Stage 1 Student of the Year, is a shipwright apprentice and Wiradjuri woman. She found her passion through hands-on TAFE learning and help from her uncles: “I watched [my boss] put a transom in and lay it up a bit and I was like, oh, this is kind of cool.” She especially enjoys fibre glassing and being on the water: “The guys are stronger in woodwork, but you put me in a glass room and I pretty much overtake them all,” she laughs.
Putting in the work
Webb-Leck says the approach of seeing and then doing at TAFE suits her style of learning: “I can’t just be told on how to do it. I have to watch it a bit and then I can replicate it.” She applies the same philosophy to her work: “There’s only the three of us at my work, so I have to do a lot of my own jobs. I’ll get shown how to do it and then I’m on that, as a small business we’ve got a lot of business to get through.” Webb-Leck’s work includes the gamut of repairs and building of marine craft, but her favourite part is glassing – working with fibreglass. “I do a lot of fibreglass work, so then when I come to TAFE, it’s a bit of a struggle because it’s all woodwork, but we do a lot of rebuild and repairs at work, so that helps me a lot. “The guys are stronger in woodwork, but you put me in a glass room and I pretty much overtake them all,” she laughs. It’s those skills and her work ethic that put her in contention for the Student of the Year award. “So many people in the class were like ‘you got it because you’re a girl’, but I’m good at what I do. I’ve come so far and I’m more trained than most people my age,” she says. “My folks, they’re actually really proud. Everyone’s really proud. It’s a lot of pressure on me, but it’s good to have pressure, because there’s been a few rough days and rough weeks where I’ve thought about leaving just because it’s rough but I pulled through. I start thinking about that and I’m just like, whoa, I’ve come this far, there’s so much riding on it. Those days where it gets really hard and your boss is angry at you, you’re angry at yourself and you kind of just have to go with it.” She says her love of being on the water also helps and reminds her of why she’s working so hard, but also of being a kid and constantly going up river with her dad. “I learned how to ski when I was four – dad grew up on the water, his mates grew up on the water, his dad grew up on the water,” she says. “Quiet weekends when you go out on the water with your mates and you have the whole water to yourself and we don’t stop skiing, it’s just fun.” Aside from playing netball, most of her hobbies, such as water-skiing, revolve around the water: “Power boat races are pretty cool to watch. We’ll go to Yarrawonga to watch them and then when they come back down to the Hawks, we’ll watch them again. There are a lot of different designed hulls and motors in there. It’s really fun – they’re one of the best weekends.” Between work, her apprenticeship, friends and family, she also continues to spend time with her dad on the water and looks forward to one day helping him race his boat. “My dad wants to race his boat. He’s got a car motor in it, but he’s always wanted to race it. So if he was to race that, I’d race that with him just for the fun of it, not for any competition, just see how quick we can go,” she says. “If we actually put work into it and do it, then yeah, maybe we can do it.”
By Diana Ward
This article was originally published in the Australian TAFE Teacher, Autumn 2025