YARRA Ranges SDS (formerly Mount Evelyn Special Developmental School) has made a link with a local business, Yarra Valley Gourmet Foods, to provide their students with real life work experience.
When Assistant Principal, Janet Taylor, met the staff at Yarra Valley Gourmet Foods, at a local market, a mutually beneficial relationship blossomed.
Jacqui Harvey, the owner of Yarra Valley Gourmet Foods, has described the students who have completed work experience at her business as brilliant and a part of their community.
She also has appreciated the awareness it has made of the community as a whole.
While she admits she has enjoyed giving back to the community, she feels the students who attend have given a lot to her workplace.
The students, who attend, work in the warehouse and help with the packaging and labelling of their products.
It gives the students a chance to apply the numeracy and literacy skills they learn in class and be a part of a workplace.
At Yarra Ranges SDS, the students have numerous opportunities to practice their work skills both inside and outside the school.
The school has a school cafe and canteen program, a gardening program and enterprise group in the school.
The students also do Meals on Wheels, warehousing at Eastern Food Alliance, and gardening at the Yarraview Nursery.
All these relationships are of vital importance to the school community.
Links with local business are highly valued and sought after.
If you are interested in providing work experience, feel free to contact the school.
