Last month, West Coast was delighted to join with West Perth Football Club and ECU to take part in a special event for Perth high school students.

Entitled ‘Study Hard Play Hard’ the event involved an array of sporting stars, including this year’s Sandover medallist Aaron Black who, at the age of 21, is the youngest person to receive the accolade since John Todd in 1955.  

Aaron is currently studying a Bachelor of Education at ECU and was able to share his positive experiences with the students and VIPs as part of a guest speaker panel interview, facilitated by West Coast’s strength coach Brendan Kennedy.

Aaron was joined by Kara Donnellan, an inspirational ECU student who is not only a three-time All-Australian player and triple premiership winner, but also represents Melbourne and the Western Bulldogs in the AFL Women’s exhibition games.

To top off the super star panel, Eagles Schools and Community Development Officer Joseph Wear spoke about his sports science degree which he completed at ECU in 2011.

Short videos were shown throughout the event, while student recruitment elaborated on pathways into university, and a brief exercise class was given before the guest of honour arrived: John Worsfold.

Although he boasts an AFL career spanning four decades, John Worsfold considers completing his university degree in pharmacy as the best decision of his life. Though electing to kick with the breeze in the 1992 grand final comes a close second.

The Eagles legend made the comments while speaking to around 300 students from six Perth high schools as part of a project being run by Dr Fadi Ma’ayah which uses sports role models to encourage students to undertake tertiary education.

“Tertiary degrees are so well recognised and respected worldwide and can open up so many opportunities,” Mr Worsfold said.

“With how common serious career ending injuries occur in sports, having something to fall back on is so important.”

Dr Ma’ayah said it was fantastic to see how well the students responded to Mr Worsfold’s message.

“John ‘the pharmacist’ Worsfold is an absolute legend of WA sport and he was an inspiration for the students listening,” he said.

“His message of how important it is to work hard on your education as well as your sport resonated with the students.”