A childhood love of cooking has become a life-long passion for Alyssa Heard who was last week named Victorian Apprentice of the Year after finishing her apprenticeship through FedUni TAFE and Chalambar Golf Club.
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The 21-year-old started cooking as a child and began working casually as a waitress at the golf club as a teenager before the head chef offered her a commercial cookery apprenticeship.
Having finished her apprenticeship last year, Alyssa decided to continue her studies and has taken on a patisserie course to sharpen her baking skills.
“I have been working in hospitality since I was 15 and for some time my dream has been to be a chef.”
- Victorian Apprentice of the Year Alyssa Heard
“I’ve always baked cakes, and when I started my apprenticeship I was making some cakes from home. I started putting up photos of the cakes on Facebook and started getting strangers asking me to make cakes for them, so I thought maybe I should study that more.”
Alyssa works at Ararat’s Chalambar Golf Club with regular visits to Ballarat for her training at FedUni TAFE and has ambitions to work overseas once she has paid off the house she built last year.
Her immediate travel plans are a little closer to home, heading to Sydney for a week in November to represent Victoria at the Australian Training Awards.
“We are so excited to have had the opportunity to work with Alyssa, she has been a wonderful employee, a real team player and has a promising future ahead of her,” said her manager Tim Cronin from Chalambar Golf Club.
As well as the Victorian Apprentice of the Year title, Alyssa also took out the People’s Choice Award.
“I am so excited and honoured to accept the Apprentice of the Year Award and to have taken out the People’s Choice Award as well is amazing,” Alyssa said.
“I have been working in hospitality since I was 15 and for some time my dream has been to be a chef.”
FedUni TAFE also picked up a second award in the state titles, in partnership with Nazareth Care who won the Employer Award for Apprentice Development.
Trainees working for Nazareth Care undertake Certificate III in Individual Support at Nazareth House, which is delivered by FedUni TAFE.
“I am extremely pleased to congratulate Alyssa Heard and Nazareth Care for being presented with these two outstanding awards,” said FedUni TAFE executive director Associate Professor Barry Wright.
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