Gail Larkin remembers the early days of Kurunjang Secondary College – chalkboards, typewriters and plug-and-cord phones.
The school has improved vastly since it was opened in the 1980s with only a handful of year 7 students now studying in portable classrooms.
Ms Larkin speaks of her 29 years at the school as time that has passed in the blink of an eye, even though “it feels like a lifetime ago since I started”.
Now the college has interactive whiteboards, iPads, the internet, thousands of students and dozens of staff – something she could not have envisioned when she started working with the Education Department in 1973.
Ms Larkin worked at Tottenham Technical School for 13 years before starting at Kurunjang Secondary College. “It’s been an interesting career to say the least,” Ms Larkin says. “There has never been a dull moment.”
The human resources manager says the Education Department, teachers, students and schools have improved since her teenage days working as a typist at “Totty”.
“You see the teachers grow and that in itself is a wonderful thing to see – people growing in their roles and growing in what they do,” Ms Larkin says.
“And I’m also constantly learning; I’m always picking up something new as the systems change.
“It doesn’t matter how long you’ve been in a job, every day you’re learning.”
At a ceremony recently Education Minister James Merlino presented Ms Larkin with an award celebrating her 42-year commitment to the Education Department.
