Education & Training Matters
Aimed at Plumbing lecturers, published by the Chartered Institute of Plumbing and Heating Engineering.
Aimed at Plumbing lecturers, published by the Chartered Institute of Plumbing and Heating Engineering.
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LECTURER INTERVIEW<br />
ONE TO ONE...<br />
Tracey Richardson has had an interesting<br />
career. She made the transition from<br />
the Royal Air Force to becoming a<br />
plumbing lecturer and was recently<br />
presented with a Master Plumber<br />
Certificate.<br />
ETM: What did you do before you<br />
decided to train as a plumber?<br />
TRACEY: I was a Weapons Technician in<br />
the Royal Air Force for 22 years. Ironically,<br />
Weapon Techs (armourers) were known<br />
as ‘plumbers’, which is a trade nickname<br />
that dates back to the times when the<br />
aircraft had hydraulic gun turrets with<br />
loads of pipework to maintain!<br />
ETM: What made you choose<br />
plumbing?<br />
TRACEY: When I came to the end of my<br />
22 year service, I did a two-day ‘taster’<br />
plumbing course. This was just one of<br />
the short courses I took when I did my<br />
resettlement training. I was initially going<br />
to become a tutor for adults with learning<br />
difficulties (I also gained a Postgraduate<br />
Certificate in <strong>Education</strong> (PGCE) in special<br />
learning difficulties whilst in the RAF), but<br />
when the resettlement clerk piped up,<br />
“You’ll never be short of work as a female<br />
plumber,” the seed was sown and I’ve<br />
never looked back since!<br />
ETM: Was it difficult to get work<br />
experience?<br />
TRACEY: I gained work experience from<br />
colleagues who I used to work with in the<br />
RAF (ironically, the one I completed my<br />
gas experience with used to be one that<br />
worked for me as a Junior Technician, so it<br />
was a bit of the boot on the other foot!)<br />
and also another friend who had his own<br />
plumbing company. I had done a bit of<br />
general plumbing over the years, before I<br />
left the RAF, but this was normally just<br />
maintenance type activities or replacement<br />
tasks.<br />
I gained my qualifications from South<br />
Staffordshire College. It took me five years<br />
from starting my Level 2 to completing my<br />
Level 3, as I wanted to get as much experience<br />
as possible under my belt. I had my<br />
own company for seven years, before<br />
winding it up to concentrate on the<br />
teaching side.<br />
ETM: Did you find it difficult to get into<br />
teaching?<br />
TRACEY: I actually did my teaching<br />
qualifications whilst in the RAF, as I spent<br />
the last six years teaching the new recruits<br />
their trade. This certainly helped me when<br />
I went back into teaching as a plumber at<br />
the South Staffordshire College, following<br />
10 Summer 2015 ETM
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