by Heidi Hackman, Stelly’s Secondary School & Colleen McNamee, Parkland Secondary School | photo by Janis Jean Photography –
Most of us would agree that high school students have more opportunities today than in the past. But with all of these opportunities comes the task of making a decision, and this can be what hinders students from taking full advantage. Tristan Bibb’s journey shows how he fully embraced the opportunities available to him through the Saanich School District’s Career Education Department.
Every journey begins with that first step and Tristan’s started early in grade 10 when he took a dual credit course, TEAC 105, a Technology/Engineering sampler course offered at Camosun College. This course exposes students to four different engineering areas –Mechanical, Civil, Computer and Electronics. This course helped to ignite his passions for all things Electrical and gave him a taste of Dual Credit programs and College.
Tristan worked with his career teacher, Colleen McNamee, to create a plan that would allow him to take his Foundation/Level 1 Electrical program at Camosun College in his Grade 12 year. In the process of making that plan, Tristan mentioned that he had a dream of being a volunteer firefighter as well as an electrician. Lucky for him, the Saanich School District has a partnership that allowed Tristan to participate in a week-long fire cadet camp during spring break of his Grade 11 year on Pender Island. Some choices are not always easy to make and in order to participate in the Electrical Foundation/Level 1 program Tristan made the hard decision to be away from Parkland for his final year, but it is a choice he doesn’t regret: “I would encourage any high schoolers who are on the fence to go for anything that will set them ahead.” Tristan’s mom Siobhan agrees. She said all his choices were “great opportunities for Tristan to get an early start on his career goals and gave him a foot in the door to begin his career pathway while still in high school.”
At the end of his program last March, Tristan participated in the Regional Skills Canada competition and won a silver medal. Skills Canada is like the Olympics of trades, with regional winners moving on to provincial, and then national competitions. To place second on the South Island is a big accomplishment.
With the skills Tristan acquired through these opportunities he was quickly hired by Alliance Electric Ltd. and indentured as a Youth Apprentice. The Youth Apprenticeship program is offered in partnership with the ITA (Industry Training Authority) and allows school-aged students to earn credit while working. Work did not slow down during Covid for a keen, young, talented apprentice and Tristan has just completed the four Youth Work in Trades courses and logged more than 900 hours. In the spring we will be delighted to present the BC Ministry of Education $1,000 YWIT award to Tristan for his efforts. In the fall he is going to be able to register in the Level 2 Electrical courses at Camosun; pretty amazing for an 18 year old! When asked what he likes about being an electrician Tristan says: “I get to have a mentally stimulating job that also allows me to work with my hands.”
It has been said by many that your life is a product of your choices. Tristan Bibb is seeing how the choices he made at 15 are shaping his very bright future.
To learn more, visit http://careered.sd63.bc.ca.
