Training and Education
Learn to be a General Purpose Hand in a practical, immersive environment.
Providing General Purpose Hand Training to enter the Maritime Industry with a Certificate 1 Maritime Operations.
Help support the training of Indigenous Australians to close the GAP in Indigenous employment in the maritime industry.
Your support will enable us to help meet our goal to increase the number of Indigenous Australians trained and employed in Australia's maritime industry by 5% within 10 years.
Image Top: A graduate student from our first program was selected to attend the Coronation of HM King Charles III with The Hon Julie Bishop in May 2023. This photo shows other graduates from Prince's Trust programs within the Commonwealth who also attended.
Images Centre to Bottom: Hands-on training for the GPH Certification.
The Sea Heritage Foundation has been working closely with TAFE NSW over the past three years and has developed and delivered a hands-on, holistic Indigenous Maritime Operations Certificate 1, General Purpose Hand course onboard the MV Cape Don. The course was developed to address the significant gap in Indigenous employment within the maritime sector.
The first successful course was delivered in 2022 in partnership with The Prince’s Trust Australia and TAFE NSW. The second course commenced in July 2023 with the support of several program partners, including the North Sydney City Council, SERCO Defence Maritime Services, The Australian National Maritime Museum, Cunard Australia, Shipping Australia Limited, and Heron Construction NZ.
First-Rate Course to Close the Gap
Why are we the go-to provider in a market with many options?
We embrace a unique maritime learning environment onboard the MV Cape Don, vessels at the National Maritime Museum, and other vessels TAFE NSW makes available for practical exams underway on the water. This prepares students for a career as a rating (deckhand/sailor) in the maritime industry and Merchant Navy.
The GPH ticket allows students to work on a variety of vessels including Workboats, tug boats, fishing vessels, pilot vessels, barges, ferries, charter boats, whale-watching boats, dive boats, & tourist boats.
Training incorporates some traditional theory with a heavy practical competency learning component in a hands-on environment to maximise the learning and retention of information in a Learn-Do-Learn-Do framework.
Our professional registered training organisation (RTO) TAFE NSW has well over 50 years experience in education and is an industry leader in New South Wales.
The Sea Heritage Foundation are also facilitating employment pathways for our graduates to create social and economic change within education and employment.
This is achieved by working with government, industry, and our registered training organisation (TAFE NSW) to increase the national percentage of indigenous peoples employed within the maritime industry from 2.2% to 5% over the next ten years.
The National Closing the Gap Agreement sets out ambitious targets and new priority reforms that will change the way governments work to improve life outcomes experienced by Indigenous Australians.
The Sea Heritage Foundation program will help close the gap in indigenous education and employment in the Australian maritime sector and the Merchant Navy.
Members of the community can investigate the history of the Commonwealth Lighthouse Service, and the important role the MV Cape Don played in keeping Australian import and export sea lanes open, the secret work to build the over the horizon radar system off the West Australian Coast in the 1960s, the sea rescue role the ship played before the current air sea rescue model was around, the mission to recover Matthew Flinders’ historical anchors, the important training the ship did with the Antarctic Division and Australian Navy and Army amphibious units from the 1960s up to 1990 or when the ship lead the Bicentennial fleet into Sydney Harbour in 1988 or the movies the ship appeared in such as Unbroken with Angelina Jolie or Dog Watch with Sam Worthington. Imagine a storm-tossed sea, a sailing ship in distress miles from help and the white hull and golden funnel of the MV Cape Don coming at speed to help or the secret over the horizon radar the ship helped to build for the Department of Defence in during the height of the cold war off the West Australian coast offshore.
Our team can arrange an excursion to the MV Cape Don. For any help, don't hesitate to contact us.
FUTURE PLANS: NSW School Based Maritime Education Program
We have partnered with Offshore Specialist Ships Australia to deliver an important school based maritime education programme which has been closely aligned with the NSW school curriculum and approved by the NSW Education Department for delivery in NSW secondary schools to educate and inform students of the various and exciting careers within the maritime industry.
The Foundations ship-based community engagement education programmes are filled with hands-on discovery and fascinating historical tales that only the Cape Don can offer as the last remaining Commonwealth Lighthouse Tender.