There were 32 businesses and organisations there yesterday including some of the region's largest employers such as Fonterra, Silver Fern Farms, NZ Police, Oceania and Timaru District Council.

After the Expo, the students were then welcomed to a presentation at Ara Polytech and were able to view the various areas of interest to them. It was a productive and informative day for the students and gave many of them some new ideas about possible career choices. 

Read what Year 11 student Carys Connolly thought about the day:

The Year 11 students enjoyed a trip to Timaru yesterday to attend the Year 11 Pathways Expo. 

The Pathways Expo is about bringing together businesses and organisations from around the area and giving students the chance to learn about possible career pathways within that organisation. There were 32 businesses and organisations there yesterday including some of the region's largest employers such as Fonterra, Silver Fern Farms, NZ Police, Oceania and Timaru District Council.

After the Expo, the students were then welcomed to a presentation at Ara Polytech and were able to view the various areas of interest to them. It was a productive and informative day for the students and gave many of them some new ideas about possible career choices

We all really enjoyed meeting different people and how they got to where they are today with their careers and the different types of jobs in a company such as Fonterra, Timaru district council and silver ferns farms. All of these companies have many different little jobs that are actually such a big part of the factories in helping them run and stay in business. We all got talked to about how they have different types of qualifications you will need which gave us an insight into how the companies work.

We had a tour of the Ara Campus. They talked to us about all the different programs they have and there were such a variety of subjects for different interests and for what you want to do when you leave school to help you get the qualifications for what you want.

We all had such a great day out and loved learning about all the different types of jobs at the Pathways Expo and learning all about Ara and how they run with all the different opportunities they provide.