Students flock to Wintec’s Huge Day Out

Thousands of high school students attended the Wintec Huge Day Out today, bringing the sunshine with them. The day is intended to show students the opportunities Wintec has to offer and encourage further studies with the facilities.
The Huge Day Out was held at both the Rotokauri and city campuses. Students came to see the different courses that are offered at Wintec, and inspire them with what their future could hold.
Hamilton Girls’ High School student Moe Kailahi said she had heard about the event through her friends at school and was interested in coming along with them. “It was cool,” she said.
Some students were chilling on the bean bags just outside the Atrium.
Among them was Manu Fehoko. The 17-year-old Hamilton Girls’ High student, said she was unsure of her career path but had enjoyed meeting new people and the music made the day interesting.
Josh Tanuvasa, 17, from St John’s was there to look for future career possibilities and see what the Wintec had to offer. Although he attended numerous classes in hairdressing, building and mocktail making, his future ambition was to study sport science at the Avalon Dr Wintec campus.
Tayla Henry, 15, from Hamilton Girls’ High School relished the day off school and enjoyed the free food. She would like to study social work at Wintec.
Wintec’s own Yak FM, based at the city campus, was enthusiastically evolved, with DJ Mitch Lang “handing out lollies to the kiddies”.
Ricky, 25, an event management student at Wintec, showed the potential future students around the campus. He explained to them the various courses that they may be interested in at Wintec. Ricky, whose role was to count the students using buses between the two Wintec campuses, said about 3000 students came for the day.
He said there would be another opportunity next February for students who missed out today.
This was the third year of the open day. Two thousand students from a variety of secondary schools attended the event, said Colleen Evans McGrory, Wintec marketing and student recruiting manager.
The aim was to personalise students’ experience at Wintec. They could go to areas like hairdressing or conducting a science experiment in the lab.
“Today is specifically about the person that is visiting,” said McGrory.
“(Huge Day out) helps turns their ‘likes’ into career paths.”
By 2.30pm things were slowing down at Wintec, as secondary students were leaving for the day. The food cabinet in the Hub cleared out, and the Huge Day Out was over for another year.

Secondary students from all over the place are checking out Wintec today. Read our coverage.

http://storify.com/WaikatoIndy/wintec-huge-day-out