7th blog

      On Monday March 4, 2013 we has a guest speaker in English class. His name was Mark Harris. He's the President and Ceo of Global Education Skills Alliance. He's an International consultant. He is from Australia. He was talking about taking an intership to Australia or New Zealand. United States, Australia and New Zealand are the founding fathers. There are eight members and four of them are in the United States. The intership consists of short and long term stays. The short term stay is three to six weeks and the long term stay is three to four months. You can stay longer but it all depends on your visa and your employer. When he was done talking about the intership we asked him a lot of questions.


      Minimum wage in Australia is $18.50 per hour but the cost of living is high. The drinking age in Australia is eighteen. The weather is really hot. You see koala bears and kangroos walking around town. There are two different kinds of kangroos. One is a grey kangroo which is calm and the other one is called Big Red. Big Red is a boxing kangroo and is found in the outback. Australia has free healthcare. The taxes on good and services is 10 percent which is added on the price. The payroll tax is on a sliding scale. If you make $35,000 for onr year theres no tax. When you file your taxes you get all your money back. The Australians dollar is $1.05 compared to the US dollar. The Australians unemployment is less than five percent. Australians drive on the opposite side of the road. Australia is known for the lucky state and the United States is known for the land of hope. Which I didn't know that. If you are in college and thinking about doing an intership and have any questions about going to Australia please checkout the website at www.gesa-edu.org. But the website won't be available until April 1, 2013. If I didn't have a family I would of considered the long term stay. Like Mark Harris said it's like a once and a lifetime opportunity.