BD14 has been developed to supply transport companies with high standard professional drivers, and Operations Manager and Founder, Karl George Burgess believes passionately in delivering excellence to his clients, and because of his supreme service and hardworking ethics he has seen BD14 grow and develop rapidly over its first 6 months. He has engaged with many local transport companies and is proud to now be the sole provider for two of the largest companies within New Zealand.
This year BD14 was excited to be able to grant its first bit of sponsorship to Tu Toa, a local Manawatu secondary school. Karl and his partner Erana Durie are very passionate and involved with this project and have run the school’s hostel during 2014 and again this year.
Tu Toa is a special character school designed to provide youth with an alternative way of learning in comparison to your traditional mainstream schools. Tu Toa has a strong focus on developing talented boys and their rugby careers as well as ensuring they learn the importance of a good education and finding the balance between the two. Tu Toa was founded by Erana’s father Dr Ra Durie some years ago. Due to the growth of Tu Toa, 2014 saw the school relocate to a larger site and the year was spent redeveloping the site and school. The last project to be completed was the school gym. Together Ra Durie and Karl have spent time sourcing sponsors and putting together a world class gym. Along with BD14, Sports Med Manawatu, (Dr Durie’s private practice) Broadway Radiology, Cookson and Forbes accountants and Clinton Pinto Radiologist from Auckland all kindly donated to successfully set up the Tu Toa school gym.
The school is dedicated to high performance in sports, academics and Te Ao Māori (the Maori world) with rugby as its major sporting focus. Tu Toa had a roll of 52 this year and they plan to lift that to about 80 next year, enough to field three rugby teams in complete squads. This year they had three teams, but there was crossover between them and the 1st XV had a few players lured away, the most notable prop Sean Paranihi to St Kentigern College in Auckland.
So far 21 students have enrolled for next year and others are being interviewed. Tu Toa do not just accept everyone who applies and about 80 per cent are enrolled from the greater Manawatu region, as far flung as Foxton, Dannevirke and Marton.
Both Karl George Burgess and Erana feel very proud and privileged to be fortunate enough to help Tu Toa. Seeing what the boys had to “workout” in last year and then being able to see them walk in and train the first time in their brand new gym was amazing! “These are the moments that make all the hard work and crazy hours working all worth it”, Karl says. Sponsorship is something both Karl and his fiancé Erana love to be able to do and hope that they will be able to continue to do so in the future.
Karl George Burgess 