Benalla's Chris Stoltz has been named on the Queen's Birthday Honours list, received an AM for significant service to engineering, as well as to charitable and emergency medical organisations.
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Despite having left town to pursue a career in engineering, Chris returns regularly to visit friends and family.
He also returns once a year to present the Grace and Albert Stoltz Memorial Scholarship at Benalla P-12 College, a school he attended under one of its previous names.
Chris said the honour, which came as a complete shock, began with an odd email address.
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“I was beavering away at my desk during COVID lock-down and I saw an email flash by that had an unusual address.
“I thought that looks interesting, so I opened it up and that’s how I learnt about it.
“I was gobsmacked.
“It didn’t sink in straight away I kept on working as I was busy and though I'd look a bit later when my wife got home.
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“That’s when it sank in and it was a bit of a funny feeling really.
“I felt thrilled, but I also feel very humbled and grateful to have been so lucky to be able to participate in the organisations that I have.”
Two of the organisations for which his involvement has led to this honour are the Royal Flying Doctors and the Sacred Heart Mission.
Chris talks fondly about his involvement with both.
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“With the Flying Doctors I often say it's an example of where the more you put in the more you get out,” Chris said.
“And I was able to see parts of Australia and meet people I would never have otherwise.
“We traveled throughout the Northern Territory and Western Australia a couple of times to visit some of the services in those areas.
“And my contribution was very much about being practical and understanding that it's one thing to raise money and feel good about it, but you want to see an outcome at the end of it and that’s what the Flying Doctors are very good at.
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“With the sacred Heart Mission we do very important work.
“People don’t just become homeless.
“They don't just wake up one day and become homeless.
“It’s a journey that can start with a family breakdown, which leads to substance abuse.
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“Which can then lead to mental illness and then eventually they get to a stage where they are homeless.
“Our role at Sacred Heart is to set them on the journey back.
“It stars with finding housing and it's about surrounding those people with services and teach them how to travel on the tram again, how to organise a meal or go to Centrelink and ultimately, how to get a job.
“We put in a social impact bond to raise the money to enable us to do that, and its quite an innovative way to deliver social services in Australia.”
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Chris, who was also a professor of practice and engineering at La Trobe University, said he hoped other youngsters in Benalla followed his journey into a successful career in engineering.
“I would say students shouldn’t be scared of engineering,” Chris said.
“It has a reputation for being difficult, but it's not really and there's so many things that engineers do that the general community don’t see.
“An example being that all of our water and sewage is underground.
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“No-one sees it, but our lifestyle depends on these things.
“There are so many other things that can be really exiting, like building bridges and roads.
“We have the 5G roll-out now, that has all been designed by engineers and is really exciting.
“There are a lot of different avenues with engineering.
“We make, design and build things that make the world a better place.”
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