Former Stawell Secondary College Student, Rhian Davidson, is our new Projects and Administration Coordinator.

Well, this is just the job I was looking for, and luckily for me – it literally fell into my lap.  But this isn’t the case for so many people looking for work, and especially the Youth in our Region.
Nine years ago, I finished year 12 here at Stawell Secondary College.  After receiving my V.C.E. I wasn’t offered a place at University, and found that my only other option was to move to the City and see what prospects were on offer. In 1995, at the age of 17, I completed a Reception, Business and Finishing course at the Suzan Johnston Organization in Melbourne.  One week before Graduation, I was offered a job as a receptionist with an accounting firm, Peter Kovac & Associates. “PKA” was a small firm of 9 staff and 2 principals, 5 of whom knew people from Stawell – how amazing!  On leaving the firm in 1998, there were 26 staff members and four principals and we had moved offices from St Kilda Road into the City. During the time I spent with, newly named Kovac Partners, I learnt simple things from using a facsimile machine right through to practice management accounting, not only that, I’d spent three and a half really formative years of my life growing up in an expanding corporate firm, the staff and principals of which are still very dear friends.

I was “poached” from my family at Kovac Partners to an Insurance Broking firm in which I spent eight months in a base reception role and decided to change paths completely. 1999 took me to an interview with law firm Blake Dawson Waldron.  A change of culture to the extreme - working in a firm of 350 people and in glamorous offices at 101 Collins Street. I was placed into the Insurance Litigation Division where we defended Personal Injury Claims (General, Workers’ Compensation, Medical Indemnity, Government claims & Dust Diseases), Product Liability and a whole lot more. I shifted around after approximately 2 years in Insurance Litigation, being one of the great advantages of working in a big firm, and gained experience in Commercial Litigation, Industrial Relations, Banking & Finance and Corporate divisions.

In 2002, I made a really big decision and moved back to my home town of Stawell, and I love it. I am so excited to be working with the Central Grampians LLEN.  Our Strategic Plan is complete, we’re putting our projects into action and I can’t wait to announce our initiatives to the Youth of our District.  I’m really passionate about improving their pathways, to help them build ideas and to point them in the right direction for a future they’ll be happy with.