School Praised For Defying Gender Roles And Teaching Teenage Girls How To Change Tyres And Check Oil Levels
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Featured Image Credit: Facebook/Stella Maris College
A school for girls in Sydney, Australia has offered its year 11 pupils a chance to learn about car maintenance as an essential life skill.
The students from Stella Maris College in Manly have been taking lessons from local 'car educators' Galmatic to learn how to look after their cars while defying gender roles at the same time.
The classes included important lessons on how to change tyres and checking the car's oil and coolant levels. For many of us, changing a tyre and changing a car's oil and coolant can be quite tricky but it is a very handy thing to know.
On their official website, Galmatic claim that they specialise in 'helping Australian women and teenagers feel comfortable behind the wheel through our hands-on car maintenance workshops and online courses.'
There were 19.8 million registered motor vehicles in Australia in January this year, an increase of 1.5 per cent from 2019.
Diesel vehicles, despite being more harmful to the environment, are great if you have to drive over long distances. In Australia, their sales increased to 25.6 per cent of the national fleet suggesting that unlike car owners in the UK who are now opting for electric vehicles more diesels, regular fuel powered engines are still well-used and future drivers must know how to care for them.
Eleni Mitakos has been running the classes for 13 years and offers all teenagers, not just girls, a chance to learn more about the basic maintenance needed for cars which isn't always.
She told Daily Mail Australia: "We teach up to 100,000 teenagers a year in schools across all parts of Sydney.
"The primary aim is for teenagers to feel comfortable behind the wheel. Ultimately they are driving very big vehicles which can be very expensive if not looked after properly.
"We can't stress enough to all our students you should never ignore a problem with your car, you need to address it for your own safety."
Amy Smith, the assistant principal in charge of well-being at the college, said that everyone took something away from the session, and that it was a greatly beneficial exercise.
She said: "We had three groups of roughly 40 girls in what we call an incursion [event on school grounds].
"The feedback was very positive, the ladies from Galmatic were very patient and thorough in what they were explaining.
"All the teaching staff and our principal Elizabeth Carnegie felt a workshop like this would be beneficial for many reasons, mainly skills the girls need to learn before they leave school.
"It was also important to show the girls that they have the capabilities to handle situations themselves once they are on the road, rather than rely on someone else."
