Wow! Sheal, so pleased to see this message this morning. Send her my congratulations too please.. Great news,
Thanks everyone! I was thinking that you may all be thinking that Hayley is quite a 'manly' type of person because of what's she doing but in fact she's quite feminine, unlike her mum. She's only 5ft 3in and small built, but she is tough! A picture for you.......
Hayley is settling into her new career, but last week taking her first pupil, she managed to get them lost, oops! She will be picking up her brand new 'office' as she puts it, very shortly, a Toyota Corolla.
Sheal, I had to meet up with my IAM bike examiner in a beach cafe where he briefed me on the route we'd be taking. As we both left to get on our bikes to start the test, I noticed he'd left his bike keys on the windowsill by our table. I still remember picking them up and following him out to our bikes! It gave me quite a smirky buzz as I handed them over to him. We're all mere mortals. Please send her my best wishes for her first bimble in the new "office", Jenny
It's time to revive this thread for an update. Hayley has lived in Canada two years this week and she's moving onwards and upwards. She and her other half are now house hunting in between climbing the ladder with her driving career. Still loving her job she was granted her licence to learn to drive HGV's two weeks ago. Things work differently out there, they don't have separate classes as here, they go straight in at the deep end with artic's, what would be our class '1' and they don't bother with the other two classes. That said, driving tests out there are taken in three stages and after passing the first stage you are allowed to drive unaccompanied on the road, the final pass is issued after three years, unless of course you train to be an instructor and the whole process is 'shrunk' and things happen quickly. Bearing in mind it can take up to five years to qualify as an instructor here in Britain, my daughter was teaching within three months in Canada. Now back to Hayley. Having started on Monday she passed her first test today, presumably within the confines of an off road area, manouvreing, un-coupling the vehicle etc., now she will be allowed on the road with an instructor. With HGV the testing happens in more defined stages so I don't know at this point what the test stages are. Next week she will spend two days learning about the air brakes and will be tested again. Hayley said she wanted to become an ice trucker, I don't think that will happen because of personal commitments but she'll certainly have the ability to do it. I'm proud of how well she's doing now after such a bad time in her first year out there. When you love your job it's so easy to progress and Hayley is an inspiration to my family as well as others. If members are interested I will keep you posted on her progress.
I would love to hear how she progresses Sheal. What a lass she is to be sure!! I have so much admiration for her focussed single mindedness. Please send my sincere best wishes for her to be able to live her dream, Jenny
It can't be two years Sheal Hayley sounds like a fabulous girl and definatley an inspiration to others...you must keep us postedit's a tonic to hear of how well she is doing
Thank you Jenny, Zigs and Loli. I hope to have some pictures of the 'mean' machines shortly, they are so much bigger and chunkier than the vehicles we see here. Hayley says even blasting the horn puts fear into people. As a driving instructor she gets quite a bit of abuse from other people on the road who don't have patience with learners, they certainly won't hassle her in one of these. On a different note, a while back she had just got into the passenger seat of her car having picked up a student. The student said don't open your door again whatever you do but just take a look to your left.......there was a bear strolling down the side of the car! So other drivers aren't the only things she has to contend with.
Wow what a coincidence. I have a daughter who is also definitely not your butch type either and guess what she does for a living? Yup she is a class 1 lorry driver!!!! Victoria, she's 25 years old passed her class 2 about 3 years ago and passed her class 1 about 10 months ago. She passed her test 1 day and was employed the next!!!her instructor was very impressed and gave her details to a person who runs an agency and they employed her on the spot. This is fantastic for her because most big transport companies like Stobbarts won't even consider employing anybody without 2 years experience (partly because insurance is tricky) so daughter has already got 10 months experience through this agency which bodes well for the future. Sheal certainly up here in Scotland daughter has found very little discrimination re her being female in a very male dominated "world" and the vast majority of the other drivers have been really kind and helpful to her. V says you are accepted if you don't try to act like a man and remain feminine altho swearing at road users who make driving these huge trucks difficult is totally acceptable!She drives a massive artic carrying veg to the likes of Tescos and M&S. Victoria is only 5ft 2ins and size 8 but like your daughter Sheal she is quite a tough cookie and loves her job! V did also mutter something about ice trucking...omg don't fancy her doing that at all! She is also keen to do some "tramping", that's driving say to the continent and live (eat, sleep etc) in the lorry for maybe a week without returning home. Do hope Hayley will sail through all the tests and be trucking soon. Hopefully she will enjoy the job as much as my daughter does.
Well done Victoria! I must admit with modern vehicles it makes it easier for females to enter into this side of the male world. Hayley works for a large driving school that teach right across the spectrum of vehicles and they own all of the vehicles that are provided for learning. She also gains in the fact that she doesn't have to pay for her lessons, which is a big bonus of course. When she has passed her test the driving school will automatically find her a place with a firm to gain road experience, once past that hurdle she will return to her driving school to teach. At present they only have one female tutor, so it will be in there interest for her to gain this experience.
All sounds good Sheal, especially as Hayley doesn't have to pay for lessons and maybe not the actual test either? It is quite expensive in the UK to get lessons in an arctic (not many people have their own/ know someone who has one to learn on!) and there are various bits to the test, not just driving. You'd be lucky to get change out of £3000 by the time you've got all the bits to the class 1. With the law having changed in the UK whereby anybody who hasn't held a driving licience prior to 1999 I think has to sit a test to drive anything over 3.5 tonnes and trial trailers over a certain size (ie horse trailers) the demand for instructors has increased dramatically and maybe Victoria will set up her own teaching business in a few years time. Perhaps it's the same in Canada that the laws about who can drive what have been tightened up. It's a rather sad fact that many of Victoria's contemporaries went to university, got degrees and large debts and can't get a half decent or any job for that matter. V chose not to go to university, was virtually bullied by her teachers to go (suppose it made them look good?) and now despite being told she would never get a good job without a degree is 10 times better of by not having gone. Computers can replace humans doing many things but think it will be a while before our 2 wee girls will find they have been replaced by robots thankfully!
