A Need for Speed

A love of speed drove Samantha Rufus's career choice. The 18-year-old moved to Pahiatua to take up a motor trades apprenticeship because she loves motorbikes. 

 

It's all about speed, Samantha says. But she also likes "the whole concept of how they work". Her Modern Apprenticeship at Tony Jury Motorcycles could see the Australian-born teenager accelerating ahead of her former classmates too. "A lot of people at high school you think are going to go on and be popular often get stuck working in New World and jobs like that.  Some of those jobs have no future, whereas this could really take you round the world," Samantha says. 

 

Samantha's father, grandfather, uncles and brothers were all into playing around on bikes, she says. She bought her own first bike, an FXR 150, when she was 15. 

 

Like many teenagers, Samantha was unsure what to do after she dropped out of school. She worked a number of different jobs around her hometown of Dannevirke, such as the supermarket, the meat works, and Hiremaster. Hiremaster had a motorbike division, and she could feel herself drawn to that. But they couldn't offer her an apprenticeship. 

 

"I worked down at the meat works for a little while, and bought myself a motorbike, one that didn't go, to try and fix it up. I saw an ad in the paper for the job here and applied, not thinking too much of it, went back to work, and they gave me a call."

 

Samantha has been doing her apprenticeship for six months and has found good support for her studies in her workplace. She never felt as though she was treated differently because she was a woman. "No, I was just one of the guys as soon as I walked in. So that was never an issue." 

 

Her boss is Motor Industry Training Organisation (MITO) registered and her workmate Robert is fully qualified. "Robert's out in the workshop and if we need studies as far as MITO goes, we've got Tony." The MITO Modern Apprenticeship coordinator comes around every six months and "basically does all the formalities". 

 

She finds the course structure clear enough. "It's set out the same way as NCEA at school... I did a lot of correspondence school. It's exactly the same." She also likes the fact that the pace is self-set, "within reason. They do have a certain minimum. But as far as fast or slow goes, you can set your own pace.

 

 "You can pretty much go as high as you want. My boss Tony started out being an apprentice and now he's got his own business."

 

 Samantha's still on the first rung of her apprenticeship, but knows that won't be forever. "The more you learn, the more you're worth." If she wants to have children in the future, the job lends itself well to working from home, she says.