Spotlight On . . .

This week our Spotlight On is on Julie from the School Office.

Julie was born in Melbourne and grew up in East Bentleigh and later moved to Clematis where along with her sisters waved excitedly to Puffing Billy every weekend for many years.  Julie and her siblings explored the local creeks and bushland around Clematis disappearing for hours on end.

Julie has been working at Syndal South for 6 years and works 4 days a week in the office. Before working in school Julie worked in accounting roles in private industry.  After losing her job at the age of 46 Julie decided it was time for a career change.  After a friend introduced her to school administration roles she fell in love with the school environment.  After she completed training in school admin and finance she did relief work in many schools and then arrived at Syndal South.

Julie has a husband and three children at home.  On weekends Julie enjoys watching her children play sport, like most parents do.  It is a great opportunity to watch them play while catching up with other parents. 

As a family Julie looked forward to family holidays.  Her love of holidays began as a child when her parents took her family to the beach at Somers each holidays.  As they got older they travelled to Queensland most years.

Julie's favourite holiday was in 2010 when as a family they went to America for 8 weeks.  They first stayed at Disneyland for a week.  That was amazing.  They had so much fun. They then hired a big RV and drove around for 6 weeks and visited 6 different states.  They learnt a lot about the American Indians, and visited some of their pueblo dwellings that still stand today.  They were able to climb little wooden ladders into caves that people lived in hundreds of years ago.

On this holiday they also experienced many different weather conditions:  Earthquakes in Mexico, Floods in Texas and the scariest one - Tornados.  They spent one night on tornado watch before going to bed and experiencing the most ferocious thunder storm.  In the morning the tornado had landed two states across.

Julie still plays netball once a week and enjoys bushwalking when she can.  At the moment her holidays are in the caravan where we enjoys going to Wilson Prom or more recently Cape Otway. There is still so much more of Australia to explore.