National Trade Teacher of the Year
Marion Fitzpatrick
Thursday night at the National Training
Awards,
Marion Fitzpatrick, Head Teacher Commercial Cookery, Northern Sydney Institute- Ryde College was named
National Trade Teacher of the Year.
Marion beat 17 other National winners in various trade teaching categories. In making the announcement, the CEO of the Institute for Trade Skills Excellence, Brian Wexham, said that Marion won the prestigious award for her outstanding commitment to developing young chefs and improving the quality of teaching offered in the hospitality sector.
This is a highly prestigious Award and great recognition for the work of Marion and the Commercial Cookery section at Ryde College. Marion is currently in Japan working as International Expert for Cookery with the Australian Worldskills Team. I wish her and the 4 students from Northern Sydney Institute all the best with their endeavors during the Worldskills competition.
Elizabeth Smith
Associate Director, Tourism, Hospitality and Events Management
Les Gyorfi- A working life
Les
Gyorfi sadly passed away on the 12th of May 2007 four
days before his eightieth birthday.
His working life, as a commercial cookery teacher both at East Sydney and then at it’s new premises in Ultimo, ended a few weeks before succumbing to a brain tumour.
The extraordinary life of this man will be greatly missed by more than a few who knew him as a teacher and a colleague. This was illustrated by the large number of friends, staff and ex students who could attended his funeral, to farewell someone who had affected all of our lives in some way. This was but a drop in the ocean of the hundreds of young chefs, taught, influenced and touched by Les’s unstinting generosity and huge knowledge of cooking. Here was a man who wore his uniform to the last, whose chef’s hat sat on his coffin, farewelled by a guard of honour in their chef’s uniforms.
Michael Mason, Head Teacher, commercial cookery and ACF NSW treasurer, had known him, professionally, since 1985 when Les was a Head Teacher, eventually retiring in his sixties a few years later to return to industry. This speaks volumes of Les’s resilience of returning to the stoves at a time when others think of taking it easy but Les was made of tougher stuff.
Michael talked of Les’s past where he had served in the Hungarian army, as an officer, to eventually starting a new life in Australia. Les knew he needed to gain Australian qualifications and achieved such outstandingly high grades in commercial cookery training that he was immediately asked to become a teacher to share his encyclopaedic knowledge with the young chefs coming through.
Michael spoke with a huge respect and admiration for this quietly spoken professional who never lost his temper and of his legendary white boards which were renown for their beautiful script and no matter how many times he had taught the same subject he would always find Les hunched over his lesson plans, making sure the students always gained the maximum benefit from their training. Les left more than a legacy of respect for knowledge of our industry and professionalism, his extensive collection of books were, also, generously donated to the college library for future generations of trainees.
Colleagues Greg Shapiro and Richard Young spoke of Les as ‘old school’ a gentleman, a great humanitarian and an inspiration, patient, humble and kind, soldering on until the last weeks of his life.
In a world of fast changing values, of a profession that is prey to fads and fashion, notorious for it’s bad temper and bullies, Les stood out as a beacon of calm to fearful young chefs beginning their careers. He was the steady river than ran through all who knew him, an example of all that can be noble, in this sometimes hard and fickle profession.
